Kingdom Ninja Cardcaptor Hearts II
by Keyblade King 12
Summary: So after a hell a lot of trouble with this story, the gang is back. And stronger than ever! They are going to tackle the Organization and the heartless forces. DISCONTINUED.
1. Chapter 1

_Prologue_

_**Author's Notes- Okay. Don't ask me what the hell has happened to this story. I've decided to keep up KNCH:COM. And maybe I'll update it when I feel like it and this story gets more popular. But this is the proper sequel for KNCH. I plan for it to have hardly any reviewers, like my other stories, but this story will be in the third person now. And it will hopefully, be longer. Gotta say thanks to Dracula X for the advice for this all and being my faithful reviewer. Sasuke's part in Castle Oblivion will be done as a story, much likely as a big one-shot. Jiminy's story, I have no idea about. But, anyway, questions need to be answered. Like Organization XIII's Somebodies. Not revealing Itachi's. That will be seen in KNCH: Reverse/Rebirth. Kisame's is Zabuza, as I've already said. Sasori's. If anyone didn't guess with the whole thing about Jiminy. Sasori was Pinocchio's Nobody. Yeah, don't ask. But anyway, his body was restored and they are back in their home world. Other things that need mentioning. Ah. Xion's replacement and Roxas' replacement. Well, it took a long time to think who would be a good fix for these two. Xion's replacement needed to have something to do with Sakura. And he has mainly her memories, but some of the other's. This person is Eli. Basically, he uses a Key Staff or Wand or whatever I decided to name it. There were no real changes in 358/2 days. Just that Namine had the job of working on three people's memories, so it took a heck of a lot longer. And it should be called something like 2 and a half years/2 days. And then there's Roxas' replacement. God, this was difficult. At first, I was thinking I would go with Haku, and for a long time, he was going to be Naruto's Nobody. It was at the least second, that I decided, right not going with him. And I have changed him into SORA. Yes, I know. But I didn't want Sora to be left out of Kingdom Hearts. Although, let it be noted that there will be no appearance of Riku. So ha! Sorry to all Riku fans, but don't really like him. Right, anything else I need to say. No. I think that's all. Oh wait. BBS. Right. Here's how they all wounded up on Destiny Isle. Riku was born there(more on that in Reverse Rebirth). Roxas. Okay, here's this lot of rubbish. Ventus is Roxas' brother. His family ruled over Twilight Town, but when he started training with MX. Vanitas' personality raged, he killed his parents and he sent Roxas to Destiny Isle, in an act of resistance. He then made Roxas and a lot of the worlds forget about Twilight Town's royal family. Naruto and Hinata. That event comes along the time when Hinata was being kidnapped. Instead, it was by Terra, but Aqua saved her and then Naruto tried to protect her from the unversed but they were both sent away. Li and Sakura were in training with Madison. But when the time came, same story, attempted kidnapping, kids sent away. And that's all folks. Now, on with this bloody story. **_

**Four children are standing in a lane, with grass on both sides. "A far off memory, that's like a scattered dream." A caramel haired boy began. "A far off memory like a scattered dream." Then a blond haired boy began speaking. "I want to line the pieces up. Yours and mine." The scene fades away and music starts to play. A group of children are playing on a beach. Three of them were in the last scene. They were making charms. There seemed to be a lot of blood, but the children were enjoying themselves just the same. These children are Roxas, Naruto, Sakura, Sasuke, Hinata, Li and Xion. One by one, the children begin to fade away, until only Roxas, Naruto and Sakura are left. They look at each other and jump towards the ocean. The beach fades away and the three are holding weapons, which resemble keys. They are looking at a castle, which is surrounded by an upside down waterfall. Small dark figures surround the castle. Heartless. They look at the three children, hungrily. Their yellow eyes gleam, in excitement. The three smirked and charged at the dark figures. Their weapons destroy the creatures, on contact. Suddenly, Roxas is battling against Sasuke, who was dressed in an outfit, which resembled that of the heartless. The other two kids were protecting the unconscious forms of their loves, Li and Hinata. Sasuke suddenly floated and his appearance changed. He has become an evil looking silver haired man. Ansem. Roxas charges and his weapons begins to change, into a larger blade. He slashes down and the scene changes to a door opening and Ansem being destroyed by the light. Sasuke and a mouse like King Mickey stand behind the door and they help Roxas, Naruto and Sakura to close the huge door. Xion fades away in Roxas' arms. Tears going down both their eyes. Hinata and Li drop down from Naruto's and Sakura's hands, down onto Destiny Isle. They look at the sky for a moment, their eyes full of longing, but their appearances change. Hinata's almost blue hair had grown down to her waist. She was wearing a white and lavender sweater, which matched her eyes. She also had on navy pants and black heel saddles. Li's brown hair was longer and his eyes had become much more serious. He was wearing a long white, with green stripes, hooded cloak and the same pattern were on his top and pants. He also had on a pair of large black boots. They both looked confused, like they couldn't remember what they were doing there. In a white room, a girl with shockingly, long black hair was drawing in a sketchbook. Namine. The picture showed a plight of spiral stairs. The picture became reality and showed Roxas, Sakura and Naruto racing to the top, with Sasuke not far behind. In the next scene, an incredibly large cricket and Roxas were battling a cloaked man. Sasori. Naruto and Sasuke were battling a giant nobody, but it didn't have a human face. It was called a Twilight Thorn. Then Sakura and Sasuke were battling Ansem and when Sakura was gone. A new dark cloaked man appeared. In the next scene, Namine and Roxas were dancing. Tears were going down their eyes. Roxas, Naruto and Sakura went into large pods, smiles on their faces. Namine suddenly gasps, and then laughs. The world shatters and the caramel haired boy is seen falling, where Naruto's pod was. The caramel haired boy is Sora. He then is seen laughing with a red head and a black haired boy. Axel and Eli. But then, the three are seen battling against each other. They are put on different cracks and Sora's is swallowed up by two figures. One in a black cloak, with red clouds on it, wearing a blind fold, the other is in red bandages, aside from his right eye and mouth. Then their figures turn into birds, surrounding Sora. The scene fades again and shows a beach, but it is covered in darkness. Two cloaked figures were standing talking. "I've been to see him." One of the figures said. He was, obviously, in charge. "He looks a lot like you." The other boy seemed confused. "Who are you?" He asked. "I'm what's left." The other man asked, his voice was deep and full of pain. "Or…maybe I'm all there ever was." The other boy seemed to roll his eyes. "I meant your name." He said, his sarcasm was heavy. "My name is of no importance. You may call me your superior." The deeper voiced one said. "What about you?" He asked, turning on the younger cloaked figure. "Do you remember your true name?" The boy was hesitant. "My true name…is…" He faltered and the older one took it, that he couldn't remember. He began to leave, but whispered a name in the boy's ear. "Naruto."**

**Sora was, abruptly, awakened from his dreams about a blond haired knuckleheaded ninja and his friends. "Another dream about him." Sora muttered, and he opened his window and looked out to his apartment's view of Twilight Town. He looked down and smiled at his friend's waiting for him, in front of their hangout-the usual spot. He went out his apartment's back door and went in with his friends. Inside though, he couldn't help thinking about his dreams about this boy named Naruto and his friends Sakura and Roxas. 'In my dreams, I become Naruto, but my will doesn't exist there. I only react to the senses of Naruto. It's a strange feeling.' "Roxas! Are you listening?" Hayner fumed. Sora jumped. Hayner was a blond hot head, but he was also Sora's best friend. He was angry for some reason, that Sora guessed had something to do with Hayner's rival and former best friend, Seifer. "We need to clear these accusations made against us!" Hayner shouted. Sora looked at Hayner, confused. Their other friends, Pence and Olette shared this look with Sora. "What accusations?" Pence asked. Hayner looked at them all, shocked. "What? None of you heard?" He asked, completely, bewildered. Olette, Pence and Sora shook their heads, to which Hayner sighed. "Well, to be truthful, it hasn't been all that big. It's just that, there have been a lot of small time robberies. And Seifer and them, is saying that it was us lot, that stole all the -" Sora's eyes widened. Olette gave off a short cry. Pence gasped. Hayner just stood there shocked. "You heard that right? Or you understood? But I couldn't say -." Hayner said, the shock wearing on him. Immediately, the whole gang tried saying that word, but to no avail. "It's like they've stolen the word - too." Pence said, in a small voice. Hayner howled and dived into his stuff. "Seifer did this, I bet. He'll pay!" Sora shook his head and sighed. "Not the bat, Hayner." He complained. Hayner brought out a huge baseball bat, covered in nails. Olette pressed against him. "Hayner stop!" She cried. Hayner's expression softened and he put the bat back. "You're right. Seifer's not smart enough to pull off something like this." Then his eyes widened, for a moment, as if a thought just struck him. He dived into his stuff and after awhile, he cursed. "What's up now?" Sora asked. Hayner looked really fired up now. "We've been robbed too! Our - are gone too!" Hayner ran out of the usual spot. Pence, Olette and Sora ran after him. When Sora, Olette and Pence caught up with Hayner, he was shouting at Hayner, with Fuu and Rai, as his back-up. Vivi was in the background, shaking. The sandlot was Seifer's playground. And Seifer was one heck of a playground bully. "What do you want, you idiot? Here to steal more of our -?" He said, with that cocky attitude of his. Hayner growled, and threw a punch, which was caught by Rai. "No one hurts Seifer, you know?" Hayner attempted another punch, but Pence and Olette dragged him back, leaving Roxas to deal with Seifer. "C'mon dude." Sora said, pleadingly. "You and I both know, that neither one of our groups took the -, so why don't we just team up and find the real culprit." Seifer snickered. "I already know who the culprits are-you- are who would think that we stole the -? We're the Twilight Town Disciplinary Committee!" Fuu and Rai nodded. Suddenly, Seifer grabbed Sora by his collar and hoisted him up. Seifer glared at Sora, and smirked. "Also. I know it was you, because one of the - you stole, was the proof of your defeat. You stole it, so your embarrassment would end, right? Well your wrong!" Seifer threw Sora away. Hayner howled in rage. Pence and Olette gasped and ran to check he was all right. Sora was winded. He stood up, shakily, and coughed up a little blood. When he, finally, looked Seifer, the bully threw him a struggle bat. Pointing his own, at the other blond, mockingly. "Take it." Seifer commanded. "I'll make you kneel before me, again!" Seifer cried, chuckling to himself, and allowing Fuu and Rai to join in. Seifer leaned in, swiping with his bat. Roxas took to the defensive. The two clashed, and Sora fell to the floor, holding up his bat. Seifer chuckled, again. He took one mighty slash at Sora, who shot his bat right up, taking the other bat's handle, as it's target. Seifer, Fuu and Rai all gasped. The bat flew out of Seifer's hands and landed behind him. Sora stood up and took one more swipe. Seifer flinched, holding his hands out. A light went off and Sora and his friends started laughing. Pence held out the photo of a cowardly Seifer being beaten by Sora, mockingly, in the air. Just then, a flash of silver went past through Pence's hand. It stole the camera, Seifer breathed a sigh of relief, while Fuu and Rai, acting as his personal bodyguard, carrying his defeated body away. Vivi ran after the group, yelping excitedly. Pence, Olette and Hayner were entranced by the silver figure, who had made off with Pence's camera. "So he's the culprit!" Hayner growled. "Which way did it go?" Sora demanded. Pence pointed, and Sora sprinted in the direction of the Tram Common. **

**He followed it, through the hole of Tram Common, right into the infamous abandoned mansion entrance. The silver figured stopped and, abruptly, and turned. Sora scanned his thief. It had thin and sinuous body. It was, obviously, very nimble and when it came here, it seemed to be floating half the time. It seemed to be in a jumpsuit and its 'mouth' was nothing more than a zipper. 'What was this thing?' Sora thought to himself, fear starting to grip him. The silver figure moved in one swift motion, and was right at Sora's face. The caramel haired boy gasped. The figure's zipper opened and he began to speak. "We have come for you, youngest master." Sora swung his struggle bat. The figure moved away, without even the slightest bit of effort. It moved, like liquid back to the gate. Sora's eyes widened. 'What was this thing?' He thought, again. Sora turned, looking for backup. No one there. 'What was going on?' Sora thought. His friends hadn't followed him. But why? In Sora's thoughts, he hadn't noticed that he had been slowly surrounded by more of the silver figures. "There are a lot of you guys." Sora noted, out loud, trying to sound braver, than he really felt. The figures charged, from all angles. Sora jumped on one's head and got onto the mansion's locked gate. The figures changed direction and charged at him. A black hole appeared right behind Sora. The figures were going to push him through it. Sora closed his eyes and swung his bat again. The bat started to light up and became covered in numbers, until it took on a different shape, entirely. The blade like weapon slashed right through the creatures. Sora dropped to the ground, astounded. He looked at his new weapon. It looked like a ninja kunai, but it had teeth and a weird shaped handle. It reminded Sora of a key. "A Key Kunai?" Sora wondered, the name seemed so familiar. He looked down at the ground. It was covered in photos. He picked them all up and smiled. The weapon disappeared, leaving just his regular struggle bat. Now, he knew two things. One, he was insane. The second was that he had found all the photos and he could clear his name. **

**Back at the Usual Spot, the gang was admiring their lost photo. It was so weird, that the word had been stolen and then put back. The picture was of Hayner, Sora, Pence and Olette at the beach, from the previous summer. "That thief was soooo weird." Pence muttered. "I mean, who would stalk Sora?" He shook his head, in confusion. Everyone else looked at him in confusion. "What the hell are you talking about, Pence?" Hayner asked, frowning. Pence laughed, shaking his head. "Didn't you notice? All of the photos that were stolen, contained at least a glimpse of Sora in them." He said, reminding them of all of the pictures. The rest of the gang nodded, in understanding. Then Sora shuddered. Hayner took him under his arm and gave him a noogie. "Don't worry buddy! We'll protect you from any silver jumpsuit wearing freaks!" He said, boldly, to which everybody laughed to. Just then, a loud chime went out from Station Plaza. Everyone blinked, in surprise. "That time already?" Olette asked, sadly. "Wow. This first day went by so fast. There's only seven days left for summer vacation." Everyone nodded, sadly. They said their goodbyes, and one by one left the Usual Spot, leaving Sora as the last one. Just as he was about to leave, he stumbled. He gasped for breath. His vision was becoming full of white lines, like static. Sora whimpered and cried out. Nobody came to help him. Sora collapsed, holding his head. "We need more time." A familiar deep and somewhat depressed sounding voice said, in Sora's ears. The boy couldn't take everything that was happening. He closed his eyes and allowed his body to shut down. **

"**It seems that Organization XIII is becoming desperate." Sasuke noted. Sasuke was dressed in a cloak, worn by the Organization. His face was hidden, by the cloak. He didn't really want people seeing his face at this time. In a lot of ways, he was ashamed of what he had become, despite the necessaries of it all. He was in a dark room, where the only light was coming from a huge computer system, the other man in the room had developed. This man was Diz. He was covered in red bandages, partly except one of his eyes and mouth. Behind them both, was Sasuke's teacher, he was also responsible for developing Sasuke's ninja powers and dawn attribute powers. He had silver hair, one hell red eye, which contained the powerful ninja ocular power, known as the Sharingan. This eye, also had a scar running down it, although half of this was hidden by a mask, covering his mouth. His name was Kakashi Hatake. "It was a good idea to scatter those pictures of Roxas, around the town." The silver haired man said. Diz nodded, he had a slight smile on his face. "The dusks are very easy to trick. They're quite mindless. Any word on that red headed man, who is hanging around outside?" Sasuke answered. "His name is Axel. Apparently, he was Sora's best friend. He has a personal longing for Sora." Diz scoffed at that. "How many times do I have to tell you that Nobodies can't feel?" Sasuke scowled, behind his hood. "Roxas thought that there were exceptions to this rule, when he met Namine, and you didn't fight Sora. He didn't seem like he was acting." Diz didn't look convinced. He returned his gaze to the screen. "At any rate…" Diz said, after a moment. "The awakening will be coming up soon. Sora better be ready." **

**On top of the abandoned mansion, Axel was watching his Dancer and Dusk scouts come back from their mission. He didn't see Sora with them. He scowled. The lesser nobodies gave him a bunch of photos! "You idiots!" Axel screamed. "What am I going to do with some bloody photos!" The redhead screeched and fire erupted from his hands, burning them all to a crisp. "Looks like I'm going to have to get the real thing for myself. You guys show me where you got these from!" Axel commanded. The lesser Nobodies nodded, as best they could, and corridors of darkness opened. Axel raised his eyebrows and smiled. "I'm coming for ya buddy." **

_**Author's Notes- Okay, some new details. Sora. He's wearing his KH1 outfit. He does have a personality, for reasons that will be revealed in a little while. And Kakashi, I will try to get Reverse/Rebirth up soon. Kakashi kinda makes Sasuke accept who he is, rather than King Mickey, Namine and Diz. Although, Mickey did a lot too. Um… don't know about anything else. So anyway, Thanks for reading, Hope you enjoyed and Please review! **_


	2. Chapter 2

Nobodies can feel Sadness

_**Author's Notes- I am currently working on Reverse/Rebirth. But it's taking me awhile. I wanted it up for Halloween, but since I'm moving house I've been plenty busy. But, while it's on my mind. Happy Halloween! To all my reviewers. Hope you enjoy your Halloween Nights and parties! **_

**Sora sat up, shocked. He looked at his body, surprised. He tried to remember what happened the day, before. Had he fallen unconscious? He couldn't remember for some reason. But what he did remember was what happened in front of the old mansion. He had summoned some kind of weapon, and used it against those guys in the silver jumpsuit. That weapon. A KeyKunai? Sora frowned on his way down to the Usual Spot. When he passed through the Sandlot, he couldn't resist picking up a struggle bat and making a few swings with it, slowly a smile formed on his face, as he remembered taking down Seifer. He looked at his bat, and was actually expecting it to change into the form of the KeyKunai. But it didn't change. Sora sighed and pouted. He threw the struggle bat over his shoulder. Sora heard a loud thump, followed by a quite grunt of pain. Sora turned and saw a figure in a black coat. He was rubbing his head, and walking away. "Sorry!" Sora called out, worried that he was going to get in trouble for hitting the guy. He just seemed to go off in a huff. must have been some kind of emo. In the back of his mind, Sora registered that the cloak, which the man was wearing was somehow familiar. He brushed it off and continued to the Usual Spot. The rest of the gang was already inside, licking some sea salt ice-cream. Olette passed one to Sora. He thanked her and started devouring the salty and sweet frozen treat. "What are we doing today guys?" Hayner asked, once his ice-cream was gone. Olette frowned at him. "Homework!" She said, defiantly. Hayner rolled his eyes. "I swear we'll do it later. But right now, I don't know, I was thinking the beach." Olette bit her lip. The group hadn't been to the beach, so far, this summer and she would want to go and chow down on some watermelon down there. "But. Where would we get the money?" She asked, frowning. Hayner, Pence and Sora frowned. Leave it to Olette to think of the downside of a situation. Olette stood up. She started doing the calculations, in her head. "Money for four people to go to the beach and back, by train. Then money for food. And maybe something extra for souvenirs." Olette smiled. "Right. If we're going to go to the beach, then we'll need money, and to get money, we need to get part time jobs." All the boys gasped for air, as if the very thought of work, was killing them. Pence and Sora laughed, but Hayner stayed dead serious. Olette sighed. "Really?" Hayner shrugged. "I don't like work." He said. Sora and Pence jumped up, beside Olette. "Oh well. I guess we'll just have to go without you, dude." They mocked, smiling. Hayner's jaw fell open, in disbelief. His friends were going to go to the beach, without him. Never! He jumped up. "Fine. I'll work!" He said. The gang ran out, looking for people to get jobs from. **

**Sora tried his hand at mail delivery, using his skateboard to go around Twilight Town, giving mail to all who he had to, which was a lot. He had to go around the whole length of the Town and back, just to complete his job. He was panting, by the end of it. The woman in charge smiled at him, as he gave him his money. **

**Hayner was helping out a rich little girl, who needed help with her Grandstander work. He was a master of keeping the ball, in the air. A small crowd was gathering, and Hayner and the girl were loving the attention. They smiled at the crowd, until, at last, the act was over. They was a huge applause from the audience, and Hayner was paid, just under the amount Sora had been paid. **

**Olette and Pence were helping out with cargo and getting it up to Station Heights. Then they gave up, when they were almost run over by the cargo. So they tried getting rid of some bees, and quit, when the bees started chasing them. They finally found something they were half decent at, when they started cleaning up the streets. By this time, Sora and Hayner had moved onto putting up posters. They detailed that the struggle competition was coming up, in two days. "Are we still entering together?" Hayner asked, as the two were putting up the posters. Sora nodded. "Good. We can fight in the finals. That way whoever wins, we can split the prize money between the four of us." Sora smiled, shakily. He still wasn't sure he was a good a fighter, as the rest of the guys, but he was going to try his best. "It's a promise then!" Hayner exclaimed, putting up the last poster. Hayner and Sora went and collected the money, they earned for doing the posters and added it to the collection that Pence and Olette had got. Olette had pulled out a special, hand-made pouch. She had been counting all the munny, in her head. "WOW!" Olette exclaimed, happily. "We raised 5000 munny!" She said, throwing up the pouch. She handed it to Sora. "Don't let Pence and Hayner get their hands on this. They'll waste it, in seconds." Olette said, entrusting the pouch, into Sora's hands, leaving Pence and Hayner to storm off to the station's entrance, pouty faced. **

"**They want to go to the beach?" Diz asked, somewhat amused. "Is that a bad thing?" Kakashi asked, frowning. Diz nodded. "I never designed the beach in Twilight Town. The larger I make this program, the more entry points, our enemies can use." Diz said. Kakashi nodded, understanding now the situation they were in. Sasuke remained, silent. Diz noted that. "Oh please. Don't be like that. He won't mind, being disappointed. He can't be." Sasuke scowled. "That wasn't the only thing I was thinking about. Hayner, one of your programs, suggested the beach. If there's no beach, in the simulated Twilight Town, then why did he suggest it?" Sasuke questioned. Kakashi raised his eyebrows. He had missed that point, himself. Diz hesitated. "The heart is difficult to control. I have copied the basis of every person's heart, in Twilight Town. However, their hearts cannot always been controlled. It's difficult to digitise a heart." Sasuke made a noise. "More like impossible. When are you going to learn that the heart is the most complex thing in this world. You'll never be able to understand the heart's philosophy." Diz scowled at Sasuke, who disappeared into the simulated Twilight Town.**

**Sora had started running towards the entrance of the station, but as he was running, out of nowhere, a struggle bat came and threw him off his feet. He collapsed onto the ground. Above him, was the man he had hit with a struggle bat, this morning. Was he going to get his revenge? Sora flinched, as the cloaked man raised a hand. But he was only extending it, to grab Sora's. He pulled up the blond, to his feet. "Do you feel him?" The man whispered into Sora's ear. Sora frowned. "What?" He questioned. The man sighed, and Sora saw hell red eyes staring into his skull. The man let go of Sora's hand and walked off. Sora frowned. "That was so weird." He said, aloud. "Hurry up Sora!" Hayner cried, impatient. His three friends were waiting, Olette and Pence looked a little concerned. "Who was that guy?" Pence asked, looking over Sora's shoulder, trying to find the cloaked man. Sora shook his head. "Not sure, exactly." Sora answered, truthfully. The three inspected Sora, looking for cuts and bruises. There didn't seem to any. "Hey. Wait a sec. Where's the money pouch?" Hayner asked, his eyes bulging. Sora's own eyes widened. He patted down his pockets and looked back onto the ground. The four groaned. They weren't going to the beach today. "That guy…he must have taken it." Olette said, confirming what the others were thinking. They sighed, and decided to pool some change together and buy four ice-creams. They climbed up to the top of the station and sat on the edge, licking their ice-creams. "I'm really sorry guys." Sora said, a sad and faraway look, in his eyes. "Oh come off it!" Hayner cried, hitting him on the back of the head. "So we didn't go to the beach today, this experience will always be in our memories…so we can always remember, how much of an idiot." Everyone looked at Hayner. He smiled, and held up a finger. "Wait, it gets deeper." He said. "Even if we can't be together forever, we'll always exist like this in each other's memories." The others were stunned. Then they burst into laughter. Hayner blushed. "Shut up!" He cried. Pence, Olette and Sora laughed, harder. Sora looked upon the sunset, that was spreading out throughout Twilight Town. There was something eating away at him. It was these dreams, and all these other weird events, which had been happening after them. This recent one. When he had saw that man's red eyes, he felt a shiver down his spine. They were familiar. He tried to remember them. Something very much like them, had appeared in his dreams. The Sharingan? Was that it? Sora struggled to remember, but he thought it was right. And the user of the Sharingan was Sasuke. That was his name. And then there was what Sasuke had said. 'Do you feel him?' That was what he had said. He had been talking about someone. Naruto? The person's from his dreams. "Who are you Naruto?" Sora said to himself, so that nobody else could hear. **

"**Here!" Sasuke said, throwing the pouch at Diz. "Maybe you can buy yourself some ice-cream!" Sasuke was not a happy camper. Diz seemed indifferent, and went on with tapping on his keyboard. "What's the Organization doing?" Sasuke asked Kakashi. The silver haired, ninja looked up from his novel. "Not much. They're quite… for the moment. We need to get Namine to hurry up." He said, sadly. Sasuke smiled a bit. Kakashi didn't like the predicament they were in, either, and he was starting to believe that Namine may indeed have emotions.**

**Namine was sitting beside Roxas' pod, drawing a picture of her and said Keyblade Wielder kissing atop of Station Heights. She had tears running down her face, falling onto her white dress. She looked much the same as she did two and a half years ago, when Roxas had started his great slumber. Apparently, Nobodies didn't age like humans did. Their growing was slowed or something, but in most cases, the Nobody looked older, than their Somebody. Namine stood up and looked at Roxas' face. Even though it had made sorting out the memories so much harder, Namine was, secretly, glad that Roxas had organised that he and his friends used their powers to protect their memories of their time in Castle Oblivion. "I love you." Namine said, and she left the room, unable to bare the fact that Roxas was in the same room, as her, and not be able to hug each other. She was faced with one option. She needed to extract the memories from Sora and restore Roxas, Naruto and Sakura. And the way that Diz was doing it, was not going to cut it.**

**Sora woke up and made his way to the usual spot, only to find that no one was there. Olette and Pence walked in to the room, smiling. "Thought you might be here, Sora." Olette said. "Sorry, but Hayner has to help his mom clean the house, from top to bottom. So, me and Pence are planning to go shopping. You want-" Olette stopped in mid-sentence. Sora frowned. He observed her and Pence. They had completely frozen. What was going on? He poked Pence in the stomach, and he started to fall down, like a statue. Sora grabbed Pence, before he could fall and hurt himself. "Be careful Sora." A high voice, that was clearly female, from behind him. He turned around and saw a black haired girl, in a white dress. She hadn't been there a moment ago. How had she, suddenly, appeared? "Hello Sora." She greeted him, with a smile. "I wanted to meet you, at least once. But, I need something of you. Could you meet me at the old mansion?" The black haired girl walked out of the Usual Spot and, suddenly, Pence and Olette regained mobility. "-to come with?" Olette finished her sentence, as though nothing had happened. Sora stared at them. "Did you not…What happened just there?" Sora asked, sounding like a crazy person. The two just rolled their eyes. "You're so like Hayner sometimes!" Pence accused. "You would do anything to get out of a shopping spree." The two made their way off to the shops. Sora ran past them, aiming for the old mansion. **

"**That girl…she knows something." Sora said, to himself, as he was going through the forest. Just then, four silver guys in jumpsuits, appeared. "Not you guys again!" Sora said, jumping back. The silver figures made a grab for Sora. He turned and ran, the figures following. **

**Namine was waiting for Sora, in front of the simulated old mansion. But he didn't come. Namine waited ten minutes, before deciding that something was wrong. Her hand was engulfed in light and a weapon appeared in her hands. It had only been, recently, that she had discovered the ability to wield a Keyblade. Xion had, apparently, had recovered this ability about twelve years ago. But had only really been able to use the ability when inside of Roxas. The Keyblade represented Destiny Isle. It was named Destiny's Embrace. Namine ran through the forest. She could sense Nobodies. **

**Sora ran into the Sandlot, looking for a weapon. Unfortunately, Seifer, Fuu and Rai were also in the Sandlot. "Hey there Pip Squeak!" Seifer greeted, with a sneer. "If you're here to practice for the Struggle Tournament tomorrow, you can forget it! There's no way I'll let you near a struggle bat." Sora growled, menacingly. Just then, the whole place was flooded by guys in silver jumpsuits. Seifer and his gang jumped up. "Whoa! Who are you? I demand that you get out of my town!" Seifer ordered. The creatures didn't listen to Seifer and, instead, decided to attack. Seifer, Fuu and Rai couldn't resist the attack. "Normal attacks don't work, on these guys." Sora said, remembering his last confrontation. One by one, Seifer and his friends fell to the ground, unconscious. The creatures surrounded Sora. 'If only I had the KeyKunai.' He thought, desperately. Just then, the girl with black hair came running through. She slashed and destroyed half of the enemies. And then, Sora's wish came true. Numbers surrounded his hand, along with a flash of light. The KeyKunai appeared, and Sora turned on the remaining enemies. "Ice Release!" He cried, as he trusted a large frozen lance like weapon forward. He pierced and destroyed all the remaining enemies. After the creatures had disappeared, Sora turned to the girl, with black hair. "Who are you?" Sora demanded. "What the hell is going on?" The girl sighed. "My name is Namine. And, as for what's going on with you…" Suddenly, the whole world shook. Namine and Sora both fell. Behind Sora a huge being had landed. Sora turned and gasped. It was a huge version of the small guys, in the silver jumpsuits. "A Twilight Thorn!" Namine cried. Sora seemed to remember something like this. A fight between Naruto and Sasuke versus a Twilight Thorn? 'But how did I know that?' He asked himself, in his head. The creature sent a fist down, and Sora deflected it, with his KeyKunai. Namine jumped onto the creature's fist and threw her Keyblade at the creature's eyes. But the blade was blocked by the other hand. The blade disappeared and reappeared in Namine's hand. She grimaced. "It's more intelligent, than I gathered." She said, biting her lip. Sora threw off the creature's hand and began making hand signs, at a speed that should have been impossible to use. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" He cried. Sora felt a huge tug, on his body, as his chakra left his body and started creating bodies, of its own. The clones began launching themselves, into the air. "Rasengan!" They cried, each of them holding a blue spinning sphere made of chakra. About fifty chakra spheres collided against the giant. At that moment, Namine went right up against the creature, slashing right in half. The figure dissolved and Sora turned to Namine. "Answers! Now!" Namine sighed. She held up her hand, and a black and purple portal appeared. She walked through, expecting me to follow. I did so. Letting the darkness swallow me. **

**I was in a white room. Namine was sitting on some sort of ledge. She sighed. "Before I start answering your questions. I have my own. Do you remember your true name?" A sudden wave of fury washed through Sora, but that was stopped when his memory forced up the conversation between him and a cloaked man. "My True Name is…" Suddenly, another cloaked man emerged from a dark portal. "Namine, please." He sounded concerned. "But he has a right to know!" The man sighed. "Sasuke!" Sora shouted. "That's your name, right? Why did you steal that money pouch from me, yesterday?" Sasuke shook his head. He turned to Sora. "My name is Ansem." He said, taking off his hood. He didn't look anything like Sasuke. This man was older. He had tan skin, amber eyes and long white hair styled into three points. Sora was taken back. Namine seemed quite surprised too. "But it doesn't matter, Sora, this is all just a bad dream." Another black portal appeared behind Sora, sucking him through it. **

**When Sora awoke, he was under Seifer's foot. Fuu was taking a photo, with her camera. Rai was laughing away. Fuu had a small smirk, on her lips. Sora growled, and the three backed off, laughing. "Where did those guys go?" Sora asked. Seifer turned, his face had turned solemn. "I'm not sure. They were here, and all of a sudden they disappeared." Seifer shrugged. Sora frowned. He hadn't been able to get much info today, but he was positive that something was going on. "What are you guys doing here?" Seifer's question distracted Sora. He turned and saw Hayner, Pence and Olette looking, directly, at him. Hayner's eyes were filling with tears. He turned and ran. "Hayner!" Sora cried, running after him. Olette and Pence were following, close behind. "Wait up!" Sora found Hayner in the Usual Spot. He was in a foul mood. "You were playing with Seifer?" Hayner asked, trying to keep his voice level. Sora shook his head, violently. "No! It wasn't like that. I just…" Sora's voice faltered. Hayner went silent, and Sora slumped next to Pence and Olette. "I don't get it. Why's he acting this way?" Olette bit her lip. "Hayner has issues with Seifer, as you well know. What you might not have known, is that Seifer and Hayner were best friends." Sora's eyes widened. Olette continued. "When the struggle tournament came around, Hayner and Seifer fell out. And Seifer started stealing Hayner's friends and fans. He probably thinks that Seifer's trying to steal you now." Sora nodded, understanding the situation a little better now. "That's not what's happening. And if Seifer did try to get me to be one of his little dogs, you know I'd tell him to shove it!" Hayner smirked. "Thanks." Hayner breathed. He jumped up. "Well then. I guess that all that's left is to kick Seifer's ass tomorrow!" Sora nodded and laughed. The guys decided to talk strategy for the rest of the day. Then the four went their separate ways. Hayner and Sora were the last to leave. "I've been thinking…" Sora began. Hayner gave a cry of fake shock. Sora threw him a mock punch. "I've been thinking, what happens if the two of us are faced against each other, before the last round. What do we do?" Hayner shrugged. "If that happens, then we give it our all, and see who the better fighter is." Hayner smirked, as he saw Sora's uncertainty. "You'll do fine." He said, finally, as he began his walk home. Sora smiled and made his own way home. **

"**Namine! You stupid girl! You don't get to decide how Roxas and the others wake up! Leave that to me!" Diz was shouting at Namine, who flinched, in fear. Sasuke was in the room in seconds. "Stop it Diz! You're scaring her!" Diz scowled at Sasuke, who had kept his hood down, since he had revealed his face to Sora. Diz and Sasuke stared at each other. Diz was the first to break off. He sighed, angrily. He wasn't used to children being so disobedient and fighting against him. Sasuke raised a hand and sent Namine to her room, through a corridor of darkness. She frowned, sadly, and left for her room. She began drawing, it showed Naruto and Sora existing at the same time, and then the next one showed herself and Xion dancing with Roxas. Tears slid off her eyes and splashed onto the page. "This world is so cruel…"**

_**Author's Notes- Namine! I hate writing sad pieces like that. I know how this story ends and I feel sorry for Namine, even though she has a sorta happy ending. Right, well considering this chapter, I think I changed it a lot. Why? Well, I hated that whole dream sequence, it was completely unneeded. And as for Hayner, well, there was enough sadness in this chapter, so I wanted the chapter to end, happily on their end. I mean, in the few chapters to come it's going to be really emotional. **_

_**Next Time- A struggle to Remember… **_


	3. Bonus Chapter!

**Bonus Chapter-COM and Reverse!**

_**Author's Notes- Before I start the next chapter, I want to get some battle sequences in from COM and reverse and that way I don't have to write them, because I really can't be arsed. And yes, this is really late, cause I've moved house, and I have no internet connection. But anyway, these battle scenes. There's a few actually. They go in order. First, Roxas V Sasuke Replica. Axel V Kisame. Naruto/Sasuke V Twilight Thorn. Sasuke/Sakura V Ansem. Sasuke V Itachi. Roxas/Naruto/Sakura/Jiminy V Sasori. And there's also a short battle and romance scene involving Roxas. Those are the most important scenes. And I want them out of the way. Hope you enjoy them. But, if you don't want to read a load of battle scenes. Just skip to the main story, in the next chapter. **_

_**(Roxas V Sasuke Replica- **_

"What's wrong Roxas?" Sasuke asked his former best friend. Roxas scowled in response. Naruto and Sakura growled behind their cages made of pure darkness. "You're not who you say you are." Roxas said simply and coldly. He looked at Sasuke, with absolute hatred. His eyes blazed with a fire that Sakura nor Naruto had ever seen before. And they had seen Roxas get angry. "I don't appreciate you impersonating my friend. Especially dressed like that." Roxas referred to the dark mode outfit that Sasuke was wearing. He began to smirk. "You're quite clever. It's true. I am nothing more than a replica. A shadow clone full of Sasuke's memories about his time under the control of Ansem. The power of darkness. It's so…delicious." The replica's eyes began to become full of lust. A dreamy smile on his lips. Roxas wanted to tear his face off. The X-Blade appeared in his hands. The replica's Soul Eater appeared in his hands. The two clashed against each other. Roxas' rage was fuelling his body. He moved quickly, but the replica moved just as fast. He countered all of Roxas' thrusts and parried them, as well. Roxas could hardly keep his blade, in his hands. Then the replica threw a dark ball into Roxas' stomach. The blond screamed, as his whole body started to smoke and was blown away. He started coughing up blood, as he stood up. He started panting, and his vision began to blur. "What's wrong Roxas?" The replica taunted. "You know, you're a lot weaker than I remember. Of course, you wouldn't remember that time would you?" Roxas scowled at his opponent. "I might not remember some things. But I do remember my friends. I remember the gang from Traverse Town. I remember Namine. And I remember Sasuke. I know that he's here. He'll help me through this. Even if I have to channel my darker side." Roxas raised his blade, so it was level with the replica. The tip of the golden part of the blade glowed black. "Oblivion blast!" Roxas screamed. From his blade tip, a huge black arrow emerged and shot right into the Sasuke replica. He flipped over and landed on the ground, in total shock. He had been told that Roxas would have been weak from losing the majority of his memories, but this…What was this?

That same question was being asked by Sasori to Namine, shoving a finger at a floating screen, showing the Sasuke replica and Roxas battle. Namine showed off a small smile. Sasori growled underneath his casing. He had been getting ready for battle to kill off Kisame, but Axel had volunteered to do it, instead. Sasori didn't want to object. He was happy not having to get his hands dirty. But he was extremely angry that Roxas was using a skill that hadn't shown in Roxas' memories. "How did this happen Namine? Are you keeping something from us?" Sasori asked, thankful that his puppet armour made his voice sound deeper and more menacing. Namine looked Sasori straight through the slits, in his puppet armour. Looking at Roxas, she was feeling more confident. "I'm not. Roxas just learnt and preformed that move there. His bonds with his friends, specially Sasuke, is causing his power to increase. And this 'Oblivion blast' move probably won't be the last of the new things we're about to see in his fight. Just feel Roxas' energy. His strength is increasing right now. Oh look." Namine pointed at the screen and Sasori looked on, not sure if this outcome was good or bad. 

The replica had decided to try and turn the tables on Roxas, after his last attack. "Shadow Clone jutsu!" The replica cried. Suddenly, Roxas was surrounded by clones of a clone. Everybody looked shocked. "What's going on?" Naruto cried. "What's with the jutsu?" Sasuke regarded Naruto, inside his cage, with amusement. "You really don't know much about a person who is supposed to be one of your best friends?" He gave off a laugh, and his clones copied. But the laugh was short lived. Flames burst from both sides of Roxas' X-Blade. He started spinning it, as the flames grew bigger. Soon, Roxas' body was surrounded by flames, which were absorbing the shadow clones, turning them into smoke. The replica looked taken aback. Another power that he hadn't been informed of. It seemed that Roxas' magic was actually becoming stronger, than it was before. But that was impossible, wasn't it? Apparently not so. "Blizzard!" Roxas cried, pointing his blade at the replica, who acted on his instinct by raising his arm. His arm froze and it dropped to the floor. "Fire ball jutsu!" He yelled, blowing flames from his lips melting the ice. Roxas moved fast. The Sasuke replica threw his blade straight at the blonde, who raised his blade. "Aero!" He cried. A huge gust of wind blew the blade right back at the Replica, who caught it in his hand, easily. Roxas bit his lip, while looking at his blade. "That was different." He said, more to himself than anyone else. "That's it." The Sasuke Replica screamed, in a voice that sounded quite insane. "I'll kill you! Roxas. I'll defiantly kill you. Maneyko Sharingan!" The replica's eyes changed into the hell red colour, that made Roxas' blood boil. The replica smirked. Darkness started to swirl around his body. They flew into his eyes and The replica gave off an evil laugh. "Amaterasu!" Black flames went straight at Roxas. Everyone watching gave off cries of outrage. Even Marluxia and Namine. Roxas raised his blade, again. "Stop!" He cried. Everything around Roxas came to a stop. He saw Naruto's and Sakura's look of terror. He saw the Replica's look of glee. Roxas dashed past the black flames and slashed at the Replica. Time unfroze and the Replica was forced back. The flames crashed into the wall, behind Roxas. The Twilight user wasn't finished yet, though. "Zero Gravity! Thunder!" The replica flew into the sky, and was suspended there, while bolts of electricity hit him, repeatedly. The Replica fell to the floor. He stood up, almost immediately and gave off cries of rage. The darkness was swirling around the Replica more and more. The Replica's eyes glowed red, with fury. Then they become covered in black, as well as the rest of his body. Roxas shook his head. "Even the Replica…I wonder what people see in the power of darkness. It's just as strong as light…" The replica's form was dissolving. His entire being going into one last attack. When the replica was gone, Roxas was faced with a huge Amaterasu. "Reflect." Roxas said, calmly. As the black flames touched the shield that Roxas had set up. They flew about. And ended up dissolving the dark cages that Naruto and Sakura had been trapped in. The two rushed over to their friend. Roxas smiled at them, and collapsed into their arms. 

**Axel V Kisame-**

"Kisame. Stop this. These guys will learn about their lives in due time." The gang had been lead to a memory version of Twilight Town, Roxas' home world. But Naruto couldn't help thinking that something here was familiar. The man who had lead them here, was a blue skinned shark-like man. He was part of the Organization. Now Axel had shown up and told us that this guy was bad news. Kisame sneered at Axel. "Stop? Why should I? This is how we should do things! Now that the Sasuke Replica has been destroyed, we need another plan of action. Axel said nothing. Then Kisame started to frown. Steam was coming off him. He looked at his body, as it was starting to bake. His scaly like skin was falling off him. He looked at Axel, fury in his eyes. "Stop that!" Kisame ordered. Axel gave a feeble shrug. Very uncaring. "Make me traitor." Kisame gritted his sharp teeth. "How dare you? Everybody in the Organization knows that you and Sasori are planning against Xemnas. You're just jealous that me and Itachi are getting there first!" Kisame said, in a hysterical manner. He held out his hand, and a huge buster blade appeared in his hands. It was covered in spikes. Axel's chakrams appeared in his hands. Kisame was still baking, due to a large amount of heat, being giving off by Axel. His chakrams clashed against Kisame's blade. Kisame could hardly hold up his weapon, as his speed decreased. He was becoming sluggish, while Axel's main factor was his speed. The redhead, in seconds, disarmed Kisame and had started slashing against him, from all angles. The shark-like organization member screamed out, in pain. He collapsed onto the ground, his eyes had gone white, smoke and steam rose off his body. Axel shook his head, in disgust. "So weak." He said, piercing Axel's body with his chakrams. Kisame burst into darkness. Axel turned on the gang of Key Wielders. They looked at Axel shocked. 

**Naruto/Sasuke V Twilight Thorn**

Naruto had decided to continue exploring the virtual Twilight Town. There was just something about it, that was attracting him. Roxas had gone off looking for Namine. Jiminy had gone off looking around in Kisame's laboratory. And Sakura had gone through another corridor of darkness, and he wasn't sure where she went off to. But, Naruto hadn't found anything that had attracted him anymore, than the mansion. That was until he saw the train station. Or perhaps it was a clock tower? No, a mixture. It was both, and at the top of the tower, there was a ledge, possibly big enough for people to sit on. That's when Naruto fell to his knees, clutching his head. He was getting one major headache. He didn't know when or where it came from. But suddenly, Naruto found himself being flung into the air. The knuckleheaded ninja's eyes were wide with surprise. He inhaled the sight of a huge creature. It was as big as a Darkside, maybe larger. It had the same tentacle like hair, but this creature was using it, like a weapon. Naruto activated his Byakugan, trying to find out what kind of thing this was. As his pink eyes, and large veins appeared, he saw this creature was a Nobody. Possibly the Nobody counterpart of a Darkside? Naruto summoned his KeyKunai, and while in mid-air, tried to fend off the tentacles that were trying to constrict him. "Get off him!" A familiar high cold voice commanded the creature. Suddenly, Naruto wasn't alone up in the air. Sasuke was right beside him. "Miss me?" He said, with a cocky smile. "Sasuke?" Naruto cried, in shock. Two tentacles lunged at the two, and they dodged, gracefully. "Sharingan!" Sasuke cried. Naruto noticed the blood red colour his eyes turned into, but there was something different about them. They looked…kind. Sasuke's Soul Eater slashed at the tentacle, while Naruto was using the Hyuga fighting style, going for the weak spots in the tentacle, eventually succeeding in taking it off the Nobody's body. Naruto flashed a quick grin to Sasuke, taking some balance on the Clock tower's ledge. Sasuke returned it for a second, then frowned, and threw his blade. Naruto was so shock, he almost didn't duck, but after he did, he heard a clashing sound. Behind him, one of the Nobody's tentacles had been about to attack him. Naruto nodded his thanks, and decided to finish the job on this tentacle. He threw Sasuke back his blade, and then launched himself into the air. There was an explosion of smoke, as hundreds of Narutos filled the air. "Rasengan Rain!" They cried, as the Twilight Thorn was buried in blue orbs. It gave off a high pitch wail of pain. It lay on the floor, and Naruto and Sasuke fell down, gracefully. They examined the Twilight Thorn for a moment, then the two turned to each other and started up a conversation. "You alright Naruto? I heard that those Organization members messed up with Roxas', Sakura's and your memories pretty bad." Naruto nodded, sadly. "What about you?" He asked. Sasuke shrugged. "The guy who tried me, was that fool Kisame. I saw that whole scene with the clone-replica thing. Roxas…he still wants to be my friend?" Sasuke asked, hopefully. Naruto chuckled. "Yeah. Don't know what's gotten into him. He's gone off looking for Namine now?" Sasuke frowned, his eyebrows burrowed. "Namine?" Naruto inspected Sasuke's blank face, with his own confusion. "Roxas' girl from Destiny Isle? Remember?" Sasuke was about to speak, when the earth suddenly rumbled. The Twilight Thorn launched himself, into the air, and then came back down, his fists smashing into the ground. The vibrations threw Sasuke and Naruto off balance. "Don't you mean Xion?" Sasuke asked, scaling the clock tower. Naruto followed, swiftly behind. "Xion?" Sasuke's face was full of concern. And it wasn't because he was fighting against a giant Nobody. "Naruto? Who was Roxas trying to save, when you guys were on your first adventure?" Naruto had to think for a moment. When the two were on the ledge, he answered. "…It was Namine. I think. Or…" Naruto clutched his head. "Those new memories. The ones that didn't seem right." Naruto looked Sasuke straight in the eye. "The Organization is planting new memories inside of us, but why? Who is Namine?" Sasuke didn't have an answer. But he wouldn't have much time to answer. The Twilight Thorn smashed his fist, into the ledge, sending bricks flying. The two jumped in opposite directions. "How about a nice combination attack, to put this thing down for good?" Sasuke asked, dodging several mid-air attacks. "Sounds good. My Byakugan with your Sharingan?" Naruto replied, doing the same thing. Sasuke nodded. "Do you remember the Rotation Rasengan?" He asked. Naruto shook his head, mystified. Sasuke sighed. "Giant Rasengan?" He asked, in a pleading tone. Naruto nodded, with a slight smile. Sasuke breathed a sigh of relief. "Giant Rasengan!" A huge blue orb appeared in Naruto's hands, but it was shrinking, by the second. "Your chakra's not red!" Sasuke noted. Naruto looked at his orb, and nodded slowly, as if noticing it the first time, for himself. "Careful Naruto. This move gets complicated, but it's the closet to the darkest that I dare to get, at the moment." Naruto took his distance, from Sasuke, as dark blotches appeared around his body. Soon, it was Sasuke floating inside of a black shimmering dragon, like an avatar. "Put the Rasengan, in the dragon's mouth." Sasuke cried, from inside of the dragon. Naruto did as he was told, and the moment after the Rasengan was in the Avatar's mouth, it was shot out, along with green flames. It collided with the Twilight Thorn's stomach. It crumpled for a moment, and then dissolved into darkness. Naruto and Sasuke landed on the ground. "Go and find Roxas for me, kay?" Sasuke asked, opening up a corridor of darkness, in the middle of the destroyed ground. Naruto hesitated for a moment, but then nodded. "But, could you make sure Sakura's okay for me? She went into another Corridor of Darkness. I don't know where she is though." Sasuke smiled. "Don't worry. I was already thinking about doing that. I'm leaving Roxas, because I know he doesn't need me." Naruto didn't exactly agree with that sentence, and told Sasuke his thoughts. The black haired boy frowned. "I'll think about that." He said to Naruto, as the blonde left the memory version Twilight Town. 

**Sasuke/Sakura V Ansem**

Sakura had ended up at her favourite place in the world. Destiny Isle. She breathed in the fresh salt air. She kicked against the waves on the beach. The only thought that was bothering her. It was all fake. Everything here was fake. A memory version created by Sasori. She gritted her teeth, thinking about it. She stood up, and immediately the waves went black. Sakura gasped and backed away from the ocean. The trees around her were dying. The little waterfall was drying up. The earth was cracking. And Ansem was right in front of her. Sakura screamed, and jumped away, little wings on her feet. Ansem moved across to her, floating. She noticed Guardian connected to his back. "You're not real." Sakura told herself, desperately. "Oh but I am, child." Ansem lifted her up, with one hand. He turned his head to the entrance of the Secret Place. "Stop hiding Sasuke. Unless you'd rather see your precious little friend die?" Sasuke came rushing out of the Secret Place, his Soul Eater raised. Sakura's eyes widened. "Sasuke?" She managed, despite her fear. "The real one?" Sasuke slashed against Ansem's Guardian. Sakura's sword appeared in her hands. She made Ansem unhand her, and then wings appeared on her back. She slashed against Ansem, who took the blow, with ease. He countered, blowing her backwards. Sasuke jumped back, and helped Sakura up. She thanked him, hesitantly. "What do we do?" She asked Sasuke, looking at Ansem floating across to them. Sasuke shook his head. "I'm not sure. Ansem is too powerful." The dark entity in question was right on top of the two. His eyes gleamed with victory. His smile was smug. "You have the power to defeat me, Sasuke, whether or not you use it, is up to you, but you should know, if you don't use it, I shall kill you." Sakura's eyes went from Ansem to Sasuke, as if she was watching an interesting tennis match. "I won't do it, Ansem. I not using the darkness in that way, anymore. I'll never use the Amaterasu again!" Sasuke declared, to which Ansem scowled. Sakura felt a jolt of admiration for Sasuke. He was determined not to use darkness, but if he didn't use those black flames, how would they able to defeat Ansem? "Sakura!" A high pitched familiar voice cried, in her mind. 'King Mickey?' Sakura thought. "That's right. Sakura, if you want to defeat Ansem, then you must use the thing that Roxas used to fight him- a balance of light and dark." Sakura bit her lip. Sasuke looked at Sakura, as if he had heard the conversation. He charged Ansem, trying to but Sakura time to think of a plan. 'But, I don't know how to use the power of Twilight!' "Oh no? Think Sakura. There are two of you. Sasuke is a Key Wielder too. So, he can use Star Cards." Sakura's eyes widened in realisation. "Of course." She said, aloud. "Sasuke catch!" She cried, throwing him one of her star cards. He caught it in his hands, easily. "Dark card!" He cried out, holding out the card. "Light card!" Sakura cried. The twins flew around each other encircling Sasuke. He raised his blade, and the cards dissolved into it. For a moment, Sakura thought that Sasuke would hold something like the X-Blade, but she almost straight away that, that wasn't the case. Light and Dark couldn't join together. They both existed. This was something else. Close to Twilight, but not there yet. Sasuke went fast. He slashed against Ansem, right through the Guardian. At the back, of both of the Key Wielders' minds that seemed wrong, but the feeling passed. Ansem clutched his wound. A kind of smile passed on Ansem's face. It was proud? Ansem faded into the shadows. Sasuke sighed and kneeled down onto the ground. His blade fell on the ground. Light and Dark appeared, in their card forms, back in Sakura's hand. "You okay?" She asked Sasuke. He nodded, and stood up, shakily. "I need some time to rest. I just came from battling this giant Nobody like thing. I'm pretty worn, but you need to go on." He added, making a corridor of darkness appear on the beach. Sakura looked from the COD to Sasuke. She nodded, and left, just after kissing her hero on the cheek. Sasuke blushed, slightly, as she left. Once, she was gone, he began thinking. The power he had felt when his sword had become something more. Was it a new kind of power? And then there was Ansem. He didn't seem quite right. There was something off putting about it all. And then, worse of all, he thought about the next battle, that was about to take place. A Nobody had been following him, ever since Kisame had stolen some of his memories. He turned his Sharingan on. Turned around and shouted at the shrouded figure. 

**Roxas V Sasori. Plus Roxas x Namine****scene-**

Roxas ran through the white corridors of Castle Oblivion. He owed Axel a lot for allowing him this opportunity. Namine was at the end of this corridor. Axel was an odd character. He was part of the Organization, but he had helped them. He had helped him. It was odd. These other Organization members. They were traitors? The Organization were an odd group, he just wished he knew what they were planning. Roxas smashed through the last door, on the white corridor. He saw a white room. A long table, covered in pictures and drawing supplies. He saw a little puppet sat in a birdcage. And he saw Namine. She had long black flowing hair. A white dress on. Her face was being held by a large figure, which a hidden face. He was in an Organization cloak. This must have been one of Sasori's armours. If Roxas didn't hate this guy enough, for stealing his memories and for coming up with the idea of the Sasuke Replica battling him and his friends. But then, he had the nerve to even touch his Namine! Rage took absolute control of Roxas' body. Before he knew it, his Keyblade was on the ground, and his own fists were beating into the wooden armour. His fists lay dents and cracks all over the armour. Roxas had never went so fast in his life. At the back of his mind, Roxas noticed a number of things. Namine was out of Sasori's grasp. Sasori was completely helpless. He was on the floor, but Roxas wanted to keep going. He wanted Sasori to feel pain. A dark aura surrounded his body. Suddenly, the armour cracked. Sasori's main body was revealed. A pink haired teenager. He had fear, in his glassy eyes. But Roxas kept going. His fists kept pummelling against Sasori. Tears of anger went rolling down Roxas' eyes. Said eyes, were going golden. He noticed his fists were shifting between their normal colour, and black claw like shapes. Before he knew it, he felt someone grab him from behind. He stopped. Sasori gave Roxas a fearful look, like a small child would give a playground bully, after the teacher had given him a detention. He disappeared through a corridor of darkness. Roxas' body had almost completely shut down. He could barely think. Now he understood what the power of darkness was about. It wasn't this thing. It was powered by a person's emotions. And sometimes, when a person's heart was strong, these emotions could be used as a weapon. His anger had become his weapon. Roxas looked up at the person, who was currently hugging him. It was Namine. He smiled. "Thank you." He breathed. Then Roxas fell into a deep sleep. In Roxas' dreams, he remembered a time back in Destiny Isles. There was a dance on. Him and Namine had gone together. He was, embarrassingly, dressed in a tuxedo. His spiky haired combed straight, and to the sides. Namine's dress was simple. Roxas thought it was odd, that she wasn't wearing white. It was multicoloured. Like a rainbow. Around him, people were dancing to some classical music. He saw Naruto, in his own tuxedo, dancing with Hinata. Li, in his classic kimono and Sakura, in hers. He even saw Sasuke dancing with a brown haired girl, who liked to skip. She usually played with two guys. A blonde guy and another one, who was like this star athlete at school. As Namine and Roxas danced, a new song came on. One for the kids. Later the two of them had named this song, their song. The two started singing along. "In you and I there's a new land. Angel's in flight. My Sanctuary, my sanctuary, yeah. Where fears and lies melt away." As soon as the two had sung those words. Namine's appearance had changed. She still had black hair, but it was short. She was "Xion." Roxas was awake. He looked at Namine. He frowned. "You're not my love. You're her Nobody." Namine nodded, sadly. She had returned Roxas's memories, while he had been sleeping. She didn't want to live a lie, anymore. "I'm so sorry." She said, quietly. A whisper. Roxas gave her a kind and reassuring smile, to which Namine found surprising. "Why?" She asked, astounded. "Because. You are Xion." Namine shook her head. She clutched, at her hair. "No I'm not! I'm just a vile witch, who twisted your memories! I'm-" Roxas cut her off by kissing her. "You are Xion. She is you. Xion knew that, before she disappeared, and now I know what she meant. Namine, I don't know how, but you have emotions. You're the exception to the rule that Nobodies have no emotions. Maybe Axel's like that too." She nodded, slowly. "He's kind all right." She brushed her black hair, out of her eyes. She looked at Roxas, in wonder. "How can you look at me like that? With content. You should hate me. As long as I exist, Xion can't. You'll never be with her again." Roxas gave off a light laugh. His mood had lifted, incredibly, since he had found Namine. "Don't you get it? If you exist, then so does Xion. And likewise. I'll always love the both of you." Namine's 'heart' skipped a beat. "We love you too." She said, blushing. "Your heart's a battle ground." Roxas started saying, in a sing-song voice. "You need to see that although you're not whole, nothing is broken." Namine laughed. The two kissed again. Roxas opened a corridor of darkness, himself. His memories having been returned. The two stepped inside, ready for the final battle, with Sasori. 

**Sasuke V Itachi-**

The world started to spin. Suddenly, Sasuke was standing in a black void. The ground was a blood red. Sasuke's new opponent was an Organization member. He had raven black hair, like his own. A permanent scowl, which had left marks on his skin. What surprised Sasuke the most, was the Maneyko Sharingan eyes, that stared right into his soul. "You're quite perceptive." The sharingan user said. "How long have you known of my presence, Sasuke Uchiha?" Sasuke shuddered, at the use of his full name. Only his mother knew that. Who was this guy? "Since you started." Sasuke answered. "Who are you?" He asked, his body tensing up, awaiting a fight. "I am Itachi. Number Five of the Organization's thirteen. The cloaked Schemer. Controller of Illusions. User of Lexion." As if on cue, a huge book appeared in his hands. "But enough about me. What about you, Sasuke? I think I know more about you, than even you, yourself do." Sasuke frowned, suddenly starting to feel scared and awkward. "What do you mean?" Sasuke demanded, an angry and dangerous edge to his voice. Itachi smirked, but there was no kindness there, at all. It was almost bemusement. "Sasuke. You were born on Destiny Isles, and yet you wield the sharingan. An ability only used by the Uchiha clan of the world, known as Konoha. You can't tell me you've never wondered why you have the abilities that led to Konoha having heartless in the first place." Sasuke froze up. The truth was he had often wondered where the ability had come from, but he had always put it off to being an ability that Maleficent had given to him. "Wh-at are you say-ing?" He stuttered. "I'm saying young Uchiha, that you originally come from Konoha. When you were about to be born, the Uchiha's were in a battle of good vs. bad. The Uchiha's were bad. Except your mother. Not a true Uchiha. Don't know what he was thinking. Stupid human emotions. Your mother decided that she didn't want you hunted. She begged the Third Hokage to allow her use a Gummie Ship. Eventually, your mother found Destiny Isle. She set up there, and later you were born." Sasuke stared, mouth opened, at Itachi. "How?" He asked, simply. "Your father stayed in Konoha, where he fought against the Hokage, but he too was overcome by the Maneyko sharingan, like you were. He became a heartless and got a Nobody." Sasuke paled and gasped. He was starting to understand, where this whole thing was going. Itachi nodded, with a small smile. "That's right. I guess you could say, I'm your father!" Itachi shouted (A/N- Sorry, couldn't resist). Sasuke's world almost fell apart, in that instant. He was going to fight his father's Nobody? Well, his mother always said that his father was an absolute asshole. Time to get some beat down, for mom. He charged Itachi, who raised his lexion, in defence. Sasuke found himself being forced back. Itachi advanced upon him. He began making hand signs. "Demonic Illusion: Dusk Crow!" Suddenly, Itachi's body dissolved into a flock of black crows. They flew around Sasuke and started pecking him. Sasuke tried shooing them away, but when that didn't work, he tried to use some of Maleficent's powers. The crows gave off cries, that sounded like they were happy. The darkness that Sasuke was giving off was feeding them! He gave up, and tried slicing them, with his blade, but to no avail. If he ever did get a crow, they would split into two. He needed to try something. Maybe. A thought crossed his mind. If he came from Konoha, then he should be able to use jutsu. He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate. A name came to his mind. Then he thought of the animal hand signs. "Fire style: Fire Ball jutsu!" Sasuke watched in amazement, as he breathed flames, and the crows exploded into shadows. Sasuke stood up. He looked at the floor, expectantly, and sure enough, Itachi rose up from the shadows. "Don't you want to absorb me?" Itachi mocked. Sasuke growled, in reply. He wasn't proud of his absorption times. But what could he do about it now? Could he release them? He thought for a moment, and then focused on his eyes. He focused on his collected energies. He decided to keep a small part of their strength each. But he might actually be able to release them. After that, he never wanted to use the Maneyko sharingan again. His eyes glowed. Dark shapes flew out of his eyes, in all directions. Itachi watched in amazement. "You…you actually gave up the power of the Maneyko sharingan?" Itachi demanded, apparently enraged, by Sasuke's choice. Sasuke shrugged. He was happy, with his decision. His heart didn't hurt. The weight didn't feel so heavy. He smiled. He looked at his blade and dropped it. Itachi continued to stare. "What are you doing? Are you giving up the power of darkness?" Sasuke shook his head. "Of course not. Darkness is a strong power. But light is strong too. I'm not strong enough to join the two into Nothingness or Twilight. But there's another power. I choose the power of Dawn!" Sasuke's hands glowed. A new Keyblade was appearing in his hands. Something very similar to Soul Eater appeared in his hands. But it was a stronger weapon. It had a sort of wing like design, on the side of the blade. Sasuke pointed it at Itachi, with a smile, as a red beam shot him in the chest. He collapsed and disappeared. The darkness disappeared and Sasuke smiled, as King Mickey was looking at me. But other figures were standing with him, which made me frown. One was dressed in an outfit he recognised as a basic uniform for a Konoha Jonin ranked ninja. He had silver hair, and his mouth was covered by a mask. One of his eyes was a sharingan one, but it was obvious straight away this guy wasn't an Uchiha. The other guy was Ansem. Sasuke tensed and raised his new Keyblade, which he had christened 'A way to Dawn.' Ansem grinned at the Uchiha. "Well done, Sasuke." He said. Suddenly, Ansem's face melted off, Sasuke watched in amazement, as Ansem became a different person. One wrapped in red bandages, save a few key areas. "So, what? This whole thing was a test? Or you were trying to make me use my Dawn powers?" Mickey smiled, sheepishly. "A bit of both. I also think they were trying to teach me a thing or two. Watching you Sasuke, I've learned not to fear the darkness." Sasuke managed a feeble smile, that looked more like a grimace. He stared straight at the man in bandages and the one with silver hair. "My name is Kakashi Hatake." The silver haired man said, as if reading Sasuke's thoughts. "I was a Leaf Ninja Jonin, and even at one point a member of the Ambu black Opps. One day, Diz here." He gestured to the man, in the bandages, who nodded, appreciably. "He came to my home world, and I started learning about all the worlds. He saved me from my own darkness, like you Sasuke. I am a Dawn user. I also wish to be your teacher. To teach you what kind of power you achieve through your ninja and Dawn powers." Sasuke was speechless for a moment. That was a lot to take in. A teacher? He could learn a lot of new powers and skills. He wouldn't have to rely on the Maneyko sharingan ever again. Sasuke nodded, absent minded. Kakashi thanked him, and Sasuke could see, by the way is face had lifted, he was smiling. Sasuke looked at Diz. "So, what's your deal?" He asked, curious and harshly, at the same time. Diz hesitated for a moment. "I am…someone who is trying to help your friends. Their memories are twisted, and they need my help. I also need a girl named Namine. With our powers combined, we should be able to mend your friend's memory chains." Sasuke's expression turned to that of concern. "This Namine…who is she?" He asked. "Xion's Nobody." King Mickey answered. Sasuke's eyes widened. He started nodding. Things were beginning to make sense. "And she can control memories?" He asked. Mickey nodded. "She can control the memories of all the Key Wielders and she can control memories of Key Wielders of other people." Sasuke bit his lip. That couldn't be good. 

**Roxas/Naruto/Sakura/Jiminy V Sasori-**

Roxas, Sakura, Naruto, Namine and Jiminy ended up in the same place. At the end of another long, white hallway, there was a huge white door. This was where Sasori was. The five looked at each other, with relief on their faces. Roxas put his hand up, at the same time as Jiminy. Both of them were volunteering to tell their stories first. Roxas let Jiminy go ahead. The giant cricket looked evasively at Namine. "Roxas." He began to say. "She's not the girl you think she is." Roxas chuckled. "She's already returned our memories, Jiminy. I know who she is." Sakura and Naruto nodded. They knew what Namine was, and they had pieced together that there was something not quite right with this whole memory thing. Jiminy went further to explain all of the stuff he had found out about replicas, and that the reason they were here, was because the Organization needed memories to make the clones into replicas. Everyone was pretty appalled by that information. Roxas began telling a story about how he beat the shit out of Sasori, and Namine had confided him in, about how she wasn't who he truly she had made out to be. He, conveniently, left out the parts were his darker side took over him, and about the things Namine and Roxas had talked about. Naruto told a tale about he and Sasuke had teamed up against a huge minor Nobody. And Sakura had told them about her and Sasuke winning against Ansem. Roxas was annoyed that both of his friends had seen Sasuke, when he was Sasuke's best friend, and had defeated his evil replica. They were left with only one more thing to do. Beat Sasori. Roxas told Namine to wait outside, because for one, she was frightened of Sasori and also she couldn't fight very well. As soon as the four fighters went in, to battle Sasori. Namine found herself looking at a black haired boy. His name, as she well knew, was Sasuke. She followed him to a place, where she could start rewriting the wrongs, that she had committed. 

Sasori smiled at his foes. His current one, was one made for speed and power. His main form. He had no idea, how he had gotten this form. Unlike his other Nobodies, his form looked nothing like his Somebody. But, then again, his Somebody had never been truly alive. His enemies growled at him. He rose up, from his seat. His main form had long metallic arms, sprouting from his back. People like Axel had often made jokes on his form being like that of Doctor Octopus from Spider-Man. He hated that. "Well, well Key Wielders and pet Cricket." Jiminy scowled at Sasori. "I'll commend you, on getting this far. But it all ends here." Sasori snapped his fingers. Suddenly, the lights in the room dimmed. And a moment later, they returned. The Key Wielders gasped. The whole room was covered in puppets. Puppets that had poison built into their systems. 1000 puppets to be exact. Even with Roxas' abilities to sense things and Naruto's Byakugan, it was difficult to pinpoint that number. The four had to come up with a plan fast, and somehow, they had grown to know each other, so well, that they had come up with the plan, non-verbally. Roxas and Jiminy charged. Sakura and Naruto were dealing with the puppets. Roxas' X-Blade clashed against two of Sasori's metal arms. Jiminy's umbrella clashed against the other two. This left Sasori with two useable arms. But Roxas' reflexes were to great. "Aero!" He cried, blowing Sasori away. "Zero Gravity! Stop!" He cried. Sasori hung lifeless in mid-air. Roxas smiled, and that's about all he had time for. Sasori unfroze and hit him with all six of his arms, four of which contained a paralyzing potion. Roxas could do nothing more, than fall on the ground, lifeless, leaving Jiminy to battle Sasori, alone. Meanwhile, Naruto and Sakura were fighting puppet after puppet. They hadn't fought this many heartless, at one time. This was something that they might not be able to handle. "Rotation." Naruto said for the umpteenth time. He was spinning so much, he was starting to get dizzy. Sakura wasn't doing much better. And she had Fight and Power helping her. "Infinity Blade!" She cried, cutting a bunch of puppets to ribbons. And then more took their place. The two were drenched in sweat and panting in a matter of moments. Roxas was on the floor, still in paralyze. And Jiminy was pressing his weight on his Umbrella, against Sasori's six arms. It was not looking good for these guys. Another Non-verbal action. Jiminy, Sakura and Naruto jumped back and circled around Roxas' body. "Cure." Jiminy breathed. Roxas let out a groan. He sat up, wearily. "We need a new plan." Said Naruto. Me and Sakura can't take these guys all at once. I've counted. There's still about six hundred left, and the two of us are beat." Jiminy nodded. "Sasori's no push-over. He's incredibly powerful, and I doubt he's even trying." Roxas bit his lip. He was actually thinking that they might actually die here. That thought had really only passed his thoughts, one other time. When Sakura and Naruto were hanging over the floating Destiny Isle, and if he tried to save them, he and his friends would die in the process. Back then, he had summoned the X-Blade to save them. But he had the X-Blade, and it wasn't doing him any good. He needed to try something else. Different attacks. All of them. His hands clasped around his X-Blade. In one quick motion, he threw himself into the air, his blade pointing at a small cylinder, where his heart should be. "Oathkeeper Thrust!" He cried out. Like back when he was battling against the Sasuke replica. A different kind of power. His blade had powers, he was only beginning to understand; the power of Oblivion and Oathkeeper. The X-Blade's golden tip glowed white. A white energy circled around it. Almost like a lance. The lance pierced the cylinder. The cylinder cracked open. Inside was a little shadow heartless. It squealed in pain, as it was destroyed. For a moment, Roxas was in a state of total confusion. Then he remembered what Xion said about bringing her back. Destroy the heartless, and then the Nobody. That's what brings a Somebody back into the world. Sasori hit him again with all six fists, but this time his friends were behind him. Sakura had summoned the shield card. But after it had protected Roxas, it moved into Sakura's left hand. Light and Dark were at her sides. Once the shield card was in her hand, as well as her Infinity Blade, they floated inside of it. The Shield glowed. Afterwards, it had a Yin-Yang symbol on it. Puppets dropped down, upon them. Sakura's shield grew out. As the puppets fell onto the shield, it started spinning. Becoming a vortex, and sucking all of the puppets into it. Sakura had wiped out half of the remaining puppets, in a few seconds. So of course, she practically fainted, after that. Naruto was next on the line. Even with his memories restored, his red chakra had disappeared. It was like the nine-tails chakra had left him. So, he was a lot weaker right now. But somehow, he still managed to do the best ice-style jutsu that he had ever preformed. "Ice-Style: White Whale jutsu!" The ground rumbled. Naruto told the others to get back. Then, from out of the ground, a huge horned whale rose up, crashing into all the 300 remaining puppets, taking them all out, and disappearing into a huge puddle of water. "Water Style: Twin Water Style Jutsu!" From the water, two giant dragons rose up and charged at Sasori, who smashed them away, with his four metal arms. He looked furious. He stepped towards the Key Wielders, but Jiminy stood in his way. The Key Wielders shouted, in protest to the Cricket's actions. Sasori raised his fists. "Stop it Pinocchio!" Jiminy ordered. Sasori hesitated. His eyes went blank. Jiminy raised his umbrella. It opened itself. The top glowed blue. "With the power of the blue fairy." Jiminy said, as if he was in a trance. "I am your conscious. I can declare if you are being good or bad. And Pinocchio. You've been very bad." The blue light grew brighter and engulfed Sasori. After the light faded, Sakura, Roxas and Naruto gasped. Sitting on the floor, was a little boy. "A real boy." Jiminy said, to no one in particular. Jiminy carried the little boy. He turned to his new friends. "Thank you." He said. "One day, I'll come and record your story. Roxas, can you please send me home? I come from a place called Small World." (Don't ask, but when I see some of those dolls in Gepeto's house, I think of those dolls in the world's worst ride EVER.) Roxas nodded, and he opened a Corridor of Darkness. Jiminy said a few choice words to each. Then he left, with his loved one in his arms. 

Outside, Namine was waiting for them. She hugged and kissed him. Then she led him to a room, with three large white pods. "What are these?" Roxas asked Namine. "Memory pods." She answered, simply. "I need you to sleep in these, while I fix the damage I've done to your memories. I need to wash away this whole experience." Roxas' eyes were full of annoyance. "No." He said. Namine smiled. "I'm sorry." She said. "But it needs to be done. I don't know how long it'll take, but please. I need to fix your chain of memories." Sakura's eyes were full of sympathy. Naruto's-confusion. Roxas'-sadness. Said blonde sighed, in defeat. "Alright my love." He said, kissing her once last time. He had a quick word with his friends. They nodded and each of them went inside a pod. They closed over, but before any of them could fall asleep. They each used a defensive technique, to protect the memories of their time in Castle Oblivion. It might make it harder for Namine to fix their memories, but to Roxas, especially, it was just something he had to do. When Namine started up the process and saw what the three had done, she couldn't help laughing. Sasuke joined her, wearing his new cloak. Diz and Kakashi had given him and King Mickey one, since they had decided to use Corridors of Darkness as their permanent transport. This way their hearts weren't affected. Apparently, the other Key Wielders weren't affected, because of their links to Princesses of Heart. Sasuke shrugged. He didn't care. Now was the start of his new mission. To make sure that his friends woke up, no matter what. 

Meanwhile, two boys were sitting on top of a Clock Tower/Train Station, licking Ice-cream. One had black hair, and was wearing glasses. The other boy had spiky caramel hair. The two of them were celebrating a job well done, completely unaware that they were the Keys to awakening three sleeping kids. Kids who were going to be asleep for the next two and a half years of their lives. 


	4. Chapter 4

A struggle to remember

_**Author's Notes- Hope you had a Merry Christmas everybody! Happy New Year. God. Last time, I was wishing you a happy Halloween. God damn TalkTalk and their stupid internet connection! Now I'm with BT and they're loads better. So after the special COM and reverse Chapter, we come to back to Sora's story. Today, we find him fighting in the struggle tournament! **_

**Sora woke up, after another dream about the adventures of Naruto. He had just seen Naruto go into Beast's Castle. 'The end is coming.' Sora said, absent-mindedly. With a start, Sora remembered what today was. The Struggle tournament was today. Him and Hayner were going to battle for the grand prize. Sora got dressed in his regular outfit, and ran to the Sandlot. Realising he had forgotten his struggle bat, he ran back home. **

"**Hey there dude." Hayner greeted Sora. Pence and Olette smiled and greeted him, also. The sandlot was packed with people. Either spectators or people to do with the tournament. "Hi Hayner. You ready?" The caramel haired boy asked, eagerly. Hayner gave off his famous cocky smile. "Of course. I'll meet you over at the board. They're telling the competitors over there." Sora nodded, and he watched his friend race off to where the mayor of Twilight Town was standing, along with Seifer and Vivi. Sora frowned. Nobody was quite sure how Vivi had gotten into the tournament, but he had been able to beat loads of other competitors, who hadn't gotten into the finals. "Good luck man." Pence said to Sora. He smiled and nodded. Olette flew in and gave Sora a little kiss on the cheek. "For luck." She explained, quickly. Pence snickered, and underneath his breathe he said. "You gave Hayner a kiss on the lips." The two both heard. Olette blushed bright crimson. Sora just laughed, as he went over to the other finalists. "Hello Sora." The mayor greeted him. He counted all the finalists and nodded to himself. "Right. All here? Good. You all know how to struggle. We'll have people hook the ball suits onto you, just before you fight. But, now I have to tell you the line-up. The first round sees Sora against Hayner." The two mentioned boys frowned. Hayner soon recovered and flashed Sora a confident smile. Sora still felt bad. He and Hayner were supposed to face each other in the finals, not in the first round. "And so the second rounds see Seifer against Vivi. That leaves the two winners to face off. That person gets the trophy and then the chance to go up against Setzer." Seifer's hand went up. "Is it true that we get the Champions' belt, if we win against Seitzer?" The mayor nodded, hesitantly. "Yes, but don't be disappointed if you can't beat him. He's very tough." Seifer looked unfazed, or if anything even more determined. The crew broke off, leaving Hayner and Sora to get on the stage, where the announcer was starting up the competition. The announcer was also one of the shop owners. He knew everyone in Twilight Town and everyone liked him. **

"**Welcome ladies and gentlemen! To this year's Struggle Tournament Finals! Today we see four kids from Twilight Town, who you all know and love. We have Hayner! Seifer! Sora! And Vivi!" The audience erupted into cheers. Hayner smiled, widely at the attention. Sora looked uncomfortable. "These four will be battling against each other." The announcer continued. "And one of them will have the chance to face off against Setzer." At the sound of his name, girls started screaming out, in delight. Sora saw Pence and Olette cringing, as they were surrounded by the girls. The man in question, was standing beside the mayor, and gave a little wave. The cries grew louder. The announcer began announcing the 1****st**** match. "Right here. We have our homeboy Hayner against his best friend and our little mail deliverer; Sora!" The two boys faced each other. "Stop looking like that." Hayner said, seeing the miserable look on Sora's face. Said Caramel haired boy looked up, sadly. Hayner shook his head, in disgust. "Pull yourself together man! This is supposed to be fun. You need to fight your friends sometimes. That's how life goes." Hayner said, in an odd grave voice, that made Sora frown. It sounded like Hayner wasn't talking about them, but him and someone else. But somehow, Hayner's words made Sora feel more confident. He raised his struggle bat, and made sure that all of the blue balls, that were attached to him were secure. "3...2...1...Struggle!" Hayner came in fast, swiping at Sora, who jabbed in Hayner's directions, stopping all of his swings half way. The two knowing each other's moves were evenly matched. Hayner was the first to get a few balls off of Sora, but Hayner soon had all the balls of his front taken off of him, with a few quick moves from Sora. The battle continued much like that. The two were even in skill level, but Hayner had a weight and strength advantage. Likewise, Sora was much faster and lighter than Hayner, making it easy for him to hit him, and get away, before Hayner could launch a counter. The battle was called on a matter of a time out. The person with the most balls still stuck on their body was the winner. As the bell rang, the two boys were panting and drenched in sweat. They walked off the stage, arm in arm laughing. The scores came in. Sora had 43 and Hayner had 37. Hayner was disappointed, but hid it well. He congratulated Sora on his victory. The two went off to Pence and Hayner, wanting to watch Seifer go against Vivi. **

**The crowd was continually gasping throughout the whole of the Seifer/Vivi battle. The two were going at it, ferociously. Nobody had seen Vivi use this kind of power before. Seifer was having to use his full strength against the tiny cloaked guy? Girl? It? Vivi had amazing agility and strength. Together Seifer was under serious pressure. He couldn't handle all of the hits. Blue balls were flying off his body left and right. Another thing that had people gasping. Seifer looked like he was actually getting hurt out there. Eventually, he just cried out and stopped the whole thing. Vivi stopped, but judging by the look in his eyes, he wasn't happy about it. Seifer fumed off. Soon Fuu and Rai were behind him. Before he left, Seifer turned to Sora. "That's not Vivi. Be careful." Sora frowned, as Seifer left in a great huff. Sora looked at his friends, who shrugged in reply. Sora looked up at Vivi, who stared at him, with greed? Maybe lust, if Vivi was a girl. **

**Sora stood a few feet away from Vivi. Both had their bats raised. Both were ready to battle. The announcer gave them the ok, and the two went at it with intense strength and speed. However, Vivi didn't seem to want to get rid of the blue balls that covered Sora, it seemed like he wanted to hurt Sora. If that was his goal, he was succeeding. Sora had hardly lost any of his balls, but was soon covered in bruises. Sora didn't understand what was going on, but considered using some of the jutsu that he seemed to be able to use. He dismissed the thought. Vivi wasn't a bad guy, he just seemed to struggle badly and violently. Sora swiped. Dodged. Jumped. Swiped. Got hit. Again. Again. Sora fell to the ground, exhausted. Vivi advanced on him and Sora jumped upwards, clashing into Vivi. The crowd gasped. Sora knew this wasn't the kind of thing that was tolerated in Struggle tournaments. The announcer looked between the two, anxiously. Sora had to finish this fast. Again he considered using a jutsu, but he needed to do it without a hand sign and it couldn't be a huge thing. He skimmed through all of his known jutsu. Suddenly, Sora thought of something. It wasn't exactly a jutsu, so he thought it would be alright to use. He tackled Vivi, hitting him with his bat. Constant hits. He threw Vivi into the air. Jumped. And struck the last of the balls were upon Vivi. Sora was expecting cheers to go out. None came. Had he done something wrong? He looked around. Everyone had excited looks on their faces and some had their mouths open, like they were cheering but there was no sound coming out. Everyone was frozen in place. Sora looked over at Vivi, who was looking at Sora, with lividness. With a start, Sora remembered that this was familiar. When Namine was here, she had made time stand still. Was this the same thing? The answer was no. Vivi exploded. Three Nobodies came out Vivi's tiny body. Sora gasped and stepped back. The Nobodies advanced on him, with large, fluid steps. Sora looked at my Struggle bat. He knew it was no good against the Nobodies, but what he was hoping for was that it would change into the KeyKunai. Nothing was happening. **

"**What's going on?" Kakashi asked. He and Diz were staring at the screen, which showed Sora backing away from three Nobodies that just emerged from a little creature with a pointy hat and a cloak. "The Organization is in." Diz said, gravely. Kakashi's visible eye widened. "How?" Diz shook his head and was pressing keys, rapidly, sending a digital KeyKunai to Sora. "I'm not sure. There's only the one. I think it's Axel. Figures. He's determined. I supposing he sent in the lesser Nobodies to get a location for him, so he could use a corridor of darkness to get into the mainframe." Diz let out an annoyed grunt. "If that Axel starts messing around with Sora's mind, then our work will have been for nothing." Kakashi put his book down. "I'll go in and fight him if I have to." Diz nodded, and started making arrangements to send Kakashi into the simulated Twilight Town. **

**Sora slashed at the Nobodies, with the KeyKunai that had appeared in his hands moments earlier. He had to make shadow clones to combat all of the Nobodies. These guy were tougher than the other ones he had met so far. He had an idea. It was something that seemed familiar, although he couldn't remember Naruto ever using it. He summoned out a Rasengan. Sora noted that the ball was red and not blue, like it normally was. There was a reason behind that. Kyubbi. The nine-tailed fox. But he was supposed to be inside of Naruto. Sora added this to the list of things that didn't make sense in my life. Sora planted the Rasengan at the tip of his KeyKunai, and it swirled down the blade. He impaled the KeyKunai right through the Nobody, he was facing. His clones did the same. All of the Nobodies were destroyed. **

"**Sora! Fight, fight, fight." Sora stopped dead. That voice. Those words. They sent a huge headache throughout his whole brain. They made his memories crash. Sora turned around and saw that a red headed man in a cloak, with red clouds on it. "Hey Sora." He greeted, as if we were old friends. The KeyKunai user didn't respond. He looked upset. "You don't remember me do you?" Sora shook his head. The red headed man's expression turned to one of anger. He began cursing fluently. Part of the caramel haired boy wanted to laugh, as if this was natural behaviour for this stranger. Axel looked at him again, with a look of longing. "They brainwashed you, man. I'm sorry. Look. I'm sure we can take you back to the superior and work out a way to get your memories back." I didn't understand a thing he just said. Another one for the list, I suppose. "Um…look dude. I don't know what's going on, but what I do know is that you're not telling me something and I don't like this superior. And I want to stay here and know what Namine and this Ansem guy have in store for me?" Everything that Sora had been thinking about just flowed out of him. Upon thinking about the dream with the superior, he felt uneasy and realised that he didn't like this superior. Also, Sora could see it in this man's eyes that he was uncomfortable. He didn't enjoy lying to him, or at least he wasn't telling him the truth. The man was speechless. He regarded Sora with anger. "What Namine and everyone involved with her are only out to take your life away from you." "That's enough Axel!" Another person had entered the sandlot. This man wore a military like outfit and a mask, which covered his mouth. One of his eyes was that of a sharingan. "Kakashi Hatake." Axel said, amused. "Axel. Number seven of Organization XIII or do you call yourselves Organization IX now? The Flurry of Dancing Flames. User of Chakrams. Controller of the Dancer Nobodies." Axel put his hand over where his heart should be, pretending to be touched that Kakashi remembered him so well. "You memorised it." He said, with sarcasm. Sora suddenly jumped away from between the two. He could feel the tension building between these two. "Chidori!" Kakashi cried, going at a speed, that even Sora thought was impossible to achieve. Axel blocked it, with two metallic rings. Both were covered in spikes. Kakashi jumped back, and Axel threw his chakrams at him. They burst into flames and kept going. Kakashi blew fire into his hands, and grabbed the chakrams. Sora guessed that the fire balls in his hands, were Kakashi's way of being able to touch Axel's flames. Kakashi threw back the chakrams. Axel caught them easily, and jumped upwards, lashing out kicks, while his legs were covered in fire. Kakashi blocked. Countered, with his fist full of electricity. Both of the two were quite evenly matched, but Kakashi had a better variety of attacks, not to mention he was a lot faster. "Water Style: Water Dragon jutsu! Earth Style: 1000 Hound barrage! Lightning Style: Double lightning blade!" After a dragon made of water makes him look like a drowned rat, seemingly endless dogs biting him and an 'X' shaped scar going across his front, Axel seemed pretty beat. In a last effort, Axel looked at Sora, sadly. "Sora. Come back to us." (A/N- That was my Demyx tribute. RIP Demyx.)**

**Sora looked at Kakashi with a mixture of emotions. Amazement, bewilderment and anger. Kakashi put a finger on his lips. "Sora. I'm sorry, but this world is a confusing place. Just think of Hayner, Pence and Olette." Sora nodded and closed his eyes. He tried to wash away everything he had just seen. He tried to rip up the list of things that didn't make in his life. He tried to follow Kakashi's advice and thought of Hayner, Pence and Olette. "Hayner! Pence! Olette!" **

**Cheers erupted from the audience. Sora blinked. He was holding his struggle bat. Vivi was panting, heavily across from him. "Good fight Sora." Vivi breathed. He got down off the stage. The announcer had started joining in the cheers. "That's right folks! This year's Struggle tournament winner is none other than Sora!" Sora saw Hayner, Pence and Olette smiling at him, proudly. He nodded at them. The announcer brought Hayner up on stage, along with Vivi. "You see Hayner. Since Seifer ended his match early, he was disqualified. That means you come third." Hayner's eyes lit up immediately. He pumped his fists in the air, and received a small bronze medallion. Vivi got a large silver medal and Sora got given a huge trophy, which was very well designed. Sora thought it was beautiful. Specifically, the different coloured crystal balls that were displayed upon it. Sora set the large trophy down, and it was watched carefully by Pence and Olette. The announcer called Sora and Setzer to the stage. At the sound of his name, Setzer's fans screamed out loud. The tall silver haired man strutted onto the stage. He towered, intimately, over the caramel haired boy, as he crushed his hand. "Tell you what kid." Setzer said. "How about you make this an easy win for me and I'll make it worth your while?" Sora was in shock. "Are you trying to bribe me, to take a dive?" Setzer chuckled. "You make it sound like I'm asking you to take drugs." Sora scowled. "Forget it!" Sora jumped backwards, clutching his struggle bat. Now it was Setzer's time to scowl. "You stupid little son of a bitch. I'll make you pay for your ignorance." Setzer was first off the announcer's mark. He came up on Sora fast, who deflected and parried. Setzer almost lost his grip on his bat. Sora advanced on him. **

**The whole crowd gasped in awe. Sora fell to the ground, panting in exasperation. Setzer's fans were crying. Setzer had no balls. Sora had won. Setzer had gone fully red, either from embarrassment or exhaustion. He turned to go, but was about to go back on Sora, his mouth open, as if he was going to say something. At that moment, Hayner, Pence and Olette came rushing up to congratulate Sora. The caramel haired boy smiled ear to ear, as the announcer gave him the Champion's belt. Sora was on Cloud Nine. With Pence and Olette carrying his trophy and Hayner insisting on wearing his belt, Sora was left with nothing to do, but float towards Station Heights. He almost really forgot about the mysterious Axel. While on the clock tower Sora was hit with a stroke of inspiration. He got his trophy and broke off the small crystal orbs. He threw them to his friends, who caught them, with looks on surprise on their faces. "We agreed that we would share the grand prize." Sora reminded them. Hayner was the first to object. "That was when we thought the grand prize was money." Sora placed a finger on Hayner's lips. "Do me a favour. Shut up." Hayner nodded, while Pence and Olette laughed. I held up my blue crystal up to the sky, and watched as the light from the setting sun made the crystal glisten. His friends copied. Sora smiled at the moment. Of course, a thought ruined the whole thing. **_**'They brainwashed you, man. I'm sorry. Look. I'm sure we can take you back to the superior and work out a way to get your memories back.' **_**Although he knew that Axel hadn't been fully truthful in those words, he was pretty sure that Axel was right about his memories were wrong. Sora tried surfing through his memories before the start of this week, when the pictures were stolen, but he couldn't do it well. They were blurred. He remembered more of Naruto's life than he remembered his own. He remembered the time when Naruto had ridden his first skateboard, but he couldn't remember ever taking lessons himself. Sora started breathing slowly. He was scaring himself. He tried to calm himself down and stopped thinking about the whole thing. Too bad he relaxed a little too much. His crystal fell right out of his hands. Sora's eyes bulged. He made a grab for it. Missed. Made another, shifting his weight towards the edge. Got it. And his body left the ledge. Olette screamed. Hayner made a wild grab for Sora. Pence stood there, completely stunned, his mouth handing open. Sora couldn't grip the reality of his situation. He knew he was falling. He knew that the clock tower was the largest building in the whole of Twilight Town, and it was easily over 100 feet tall. It may have all been in Sora's head, but he seemed to be falling in slow motion. He closed his eyes, not wanting to witness his own death. **

**Namine had been watching Sora all day. She had hated seeing Axel in so much pain, and knowing she was the cause of it. She really was a witch. She hated herself and her powers. The only reason she didn't kill herself was her own selfish agenda. She needed Roxas. If everyone had a light, in this world. He was hers. But to get to him, she had to get Sora to release their memories. She watched as Sora fell from the Clock Tower. She felt his conscious slipping away. 'Diz and Kakashi will be busy trying to fix this.' Namine thought, an idea slowly forming in her brain. It was something that might help point Sora in a better direction, but she also owed two other people for taking away their lights. **

**Hinata and Li were walking home from school. Two fellow classmates were walking with them. They were called Selphie and Tidus. After Sasuke and Xion had left Destiny Isle, Hinata and Li had gotten new friends, although they weren't nearly as comfortable with them, than they were with the other five…no two, right? Just Xion and Sasuke. No. Deep down, Hinata and Li both knew that they were more than the two who had left. They had had dreams of being stuck in people's bodies, with Xion. Sasuke had been a bad guy, consumed by darkness and their hosts were the bravest people in the world. They just couldn't remember them. The two said goodbye to Selphie and Tidus, and continued home. With the two orphans living together, a large variety of love-life rumours were started about the two. They had no feelings for each other, more than a strong friendship. Li turned to Hinata. "Have you noticed that the dreams are becoming more and more frequent?" Hinata nodded. "I think it's a good sign. Maybe we'll be able to remember them soon." 'Remember who?' Hinata and Li were stunned by the voice. They looked around and saw no-one. The two hadn't spoken. But who was it that had? "Who are you?" Hinata tried asking. 'I was about to ask you the same question. Who am I? Where am I? What am I doing here? Is this even real?' So many questions came from the male voice. "I'm Hinata and that's Li." The male voice was silent for a minute. "Ah. Then you two are their lights, right?" Li's and Hinata's eyes widened. Was this it? "You know them don't you? The ones that hosted us. The ones that fought against Sasuke, when he was evil." Li's voice was excited and is words flowed out of him, quickly. "Uh…yeah. What can't you remember them? Ugh. Hinata. What am I going to do with you?" The boy's voice had changed, towards his last words. Hinata recognised them, immediately. "Naruto!" She said, with a high-pitched cry, causing passer-bys to look at her, curiously. With the name, a load of memories flooded into her. She remembered everything about the three kids. Naruto, Sakura and Roxas. Li looked at her, mystified. She flashed a rare smile at him. "I remember, Li. Do you remember her? Sakura?" Li looked dumbfounded. 'Oh thanks Li. I knew I should have gone out with Sasuke.' Li rolled his eyes, at the female's voice. "Oh please, Sakura. You know you love me." Li's eyes widened. He smiled. "I remember…"**

_**Author's Notes- There you are people. In case you noticed, I did take away the whole letter thing. It's just unneeded. Next Time- The mysteries of Twilight Town! **_


	5. Chapter 5

The mysteries of Twilight Town

_**Author's Notes- Oh my God I'm paragraphing. I've finally deciding that I'm going to try my best to paragraph this story better from now on. Hopefully, this will make my story look better, and give your eyes a break. **_

**Sora jumped out of his bed, as he woke up. He looked at himself, in disbelief. What was he doing in his bed? Why wasn't he in hospital? Why didn't he even have a single scratch? Sora tried to calm down and think calmer. He was sure that he had fallen off the clock tower, and yet here he was. Alive. He shook his head. "It must have been a dream." He said to himself. But Hinata and Li, They both seemed so real. **

**As Sora was getting dressed, he remembered something. He had won the Struggle Tournament. Then there was Axel and Kakashi. They had fought. Or had that been a dream too? He looked at the trophy sitting, proudly, in the corner of his bedroom. The Champion's belt was sitting on the top of his little desk. He looked for the little blue crystal, which he had taken off the trophy. He couldn't find it. He checked all his pockets. He checked around his room. In his drawers, under the bed. Everywhere. It was gone, and while he was searching, another thought came to his mind. 'I don't even remember coming home last night…another one for the list.' This list was going to be as big as Santa's, if this kept up.**

"**There's only three days left of Summer vacation, Hayner. We need to get our homework done!" Olette and Hayner were having the same argument, that they had been having all summer. **

"**Please Olette. Don't make me do this." He moaned, making a little puppy-dog pout, in her direction. **

**Olette looked at him, sceptically. "Hayner!" She said, warningly.**

**Hayner stopped his pouting and looked towards Pence and Sora for assistance. The two looked at each other, then they saw Olette glaring at them. "Hayner. I believe that we should do our homework, like responsible young men." Sora said, making his high-pitched voice sound as grown-up as possible. **

"**Quite right, Sora, old chap. Now Hayner, we wouldn't want to get in trouble at school do we?" Pence said, putting on a horribly fake, British accent. "And I doubt Olette would be entirely impressed with you." Pence said, trying to tug on Hayner's heartstrings. **

**Hayner scowled at his chubby friend. He mouthed. 'I will kill you'. Sora and Pence burst into gales of laughter. "Then it's decided. We'll do our homework today. Now it's a research assignment, so we can do anything in the whole of Twilight Town. I asked Sensei, she says we can even investigate popular rumours Pence." **

**Pence smiled ear to ear, like something you would see fan girls doing on an anime character. What was it called? Chibi. Pence looked like a little Chibi. "Okay, Olette. There's one mystery here, but all of the other six are in the Sunset Hill area."**

**Olette waved a hand, dismissing it. "That's okay. Truth be told, I've been saving for supplies for this homework but if all we need is a return for four people, I'm sure I've got it covered." **

**Pence jumped up and picked up his map for the Seven Wonders of Twilight Town. "Let's get going then." He said, running out of the usual spot, faster than anyone had seen him go. The three others looked at each other and broke out in laughter, before setting off after him. **

**On the train ride, Sora had a look at all of the different wonders. There were a few that caught his eye, mainly because those were the ones that couldn't be explained by simple logic. 'The Friend from beyond the wall.' 'The Mysterious Train.' And…Sora's eyes bulged as he looked down at that wonder centred at the Haunted Mansion. 'The lonely Girl.' The description in Pence's untidy scrawl read. 'People say that when they look up at the window of the Haunted Mansion, a girl sometimes appears. This girl is described as being dressed in white, but with dark hair.' "Namine?"**

"**Say something Sora?" Hayner asked, looking away from the window. **

**Sora shook his head. "No…looks like we're here." Hayner, Pence and Olette looked out the window to see that Sora was right. They were at the station. **

**The gang got out of the train and Sora looked at the map, in his hands. "This says the first wonder is right here." He said, pointing at the stairway in front of him. "The spooky steps. Supposedly, there are supposed to change between going up and…pound?"**

**Pence frowned at the brunette. "Oi. If you can't read my writing, then give it to me. It says down." **

**Sora held his hands in the air and surrendered the map to Pence. "Shall we try to figure this out then?" Hayner and Olette started counting the steps going up, with Pence and Sora counting the downwards ones. **

"**I get nineteen." Hayner said, after counting. **

"**Same here." Sora said, frowning. **

"**You guys wondering about the spooky steps?" The four looked up at Rai, who was about the last off the train. "I actually discovered this little number, Y'know?" **

**Sora, Hayner, Pence and Olette looked at each other, a silent realisation passed through them all. Rai wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. He must've miscounted them. "Let's move on to the next one." Olette suggested. **

"**We should split up." Suggested Hayner. "Me and Olette will take the next couple." He and Olette looked at the map, nodded and set off. **

**Pence and Sora were going off to investigate 'The friend from beyond the wall.' Pence read. "Apparently, people find balls being thrown at them when they cross a bricked-off alleyway." **

**Sora arrived at the dead-end alley, while Pence was lagging behind. "Whoa!" Sora cried, a white ball, like what you would use in grandstander, came right at him. **

**Sora looked down the alleyway and gasped. There was no-one there, but the balls were coming straight out of the wall. "Get back!" Sora said, punching the balls away from him. One hit him in the face. **

**Sora growled and jumped off the walls, avoiding all of the balls trying to hit him. He kicked the wall, expecting it to be a screen or something, but it was a solid brick wall. His foot throbbed in pain, but the wall did seem to stop spitting out balls. **

**Pence arrived on the scene moments later. "What's with this one? Were you the one throwing that ball?" **

**Sora shook his head. "It was weird. It's like they actually came out of the wall." **

**Pence gave his partner a disapproving look. "Are you trying to spice up the report? We'll be alright without that. So, what shall we say? Some people like to throw balls at people and climb over the wall, before they're seen? Alright then." Pence started taking notes in a little book. **

**Hayner and Olette had come to collect Pence to show him that the Doppelganger rumour was nothing more than a person's reflection being shown by a small little fountain. **

**Sora was going to investigate 'The moans from the Tunnel'. **

"**Hm…" There was a huge tunnel system underneath Twilight Town. People often used it as a way of getting to the Sunset Hill area, without having to pay for a train. Sora heard the moans almost immediately, he followed the sounds, until he was at a little square area, Vivi was holding a struggle bat and was trying to pull off moves with it. **

**He was practicing and breathing hard, between battle cries. Sora found the scene quite cute, that was until he remembered at the struggle tournament, where Vivi had turned out to be one those silver jumpsuit guys, in disguise. But that had been a dream, hadn't it?**

**Sora was about to leave when. "Don't leave Number 13." Vivi commanded, in a cold high voice. **

**Sora turned on the spot. 13? Why did that number hold significance? "What did you say Vivi?" **

"**You cannot leave. We have orders to detain you." He said. We? The tunnel filled with Vivis. **

**Sora gasped. He backed up on the spot, as the Vivis advanced on him. "Get away from me!" Sora yelled, lashing out hits and kicks. The Vivis were hardly affected. Sora screamed. "Back Off! …Wind Style: Wind Scythe Hurricane Jutsu!" Sora began spinning on the spot, around him gusts of air were wrapping themselves around him and wind was cutting up the Vivis one by one. Within a matter of seconds, a dizzy Sora was left with one concerned looking Vivi. **

"**You okay, Sora? You got here and started spinning. You aren't drunk are you?" Sora shook his head. **

"**I'm fine, Vivi. Thanks for your concern." Vivi nodded at him and then left when Pence entered the room. He had a small talk with the plump boy, and then went on his way through the tunnel system. Unbeknown to them, right through a little black hole. **

"**So the moans were Vivi practicing for the struggle. It's no wonder he did so well in the Struggle Tournament then, he comes here and practices nearly every day." Pence said, taking more notes. **

**Hayner, Olette, Pence and Sora met at the foot of Sunset Hill. "There are two wonders up here. At the summit of this hill, there's supposed to be an animated bag up there. And up there's the best spot to try and get a glimpse of the wonder of the mysterious train'." **

**The gang made their way up the hill, the walk wasn't long, so even though Pence and Olette weren't the most physical involved people in the world, but they made up, easily enough. **

**Sora and Hayner arrived on the scene first. There was a huge bag jumping around on the summit. **

**The blond and the brunette looked at each other. Hayner smirked and jumped on the bag, and started riding it like at a rodeo. Sora stood his ground, as Hayner directed the bag at Sora's open arms. **

**They struggled to tame the bag. The two opened the bag, and a brown retriever dog came bustling out. He barked at Hayner and Sora. **

**Pence, Olette and a little boy came up to the summit. The boy took the dog, which was apparently his. He had put the dog in a bag to scare people. "Great way to treat your pets kid." Hayner commented.**

**The boy took the dog down the hill, pulled a kunai out of his pocket and stabbed the dog. "Damn Dusks!" The boy said, in a very low voice, that obviously belonged to an adult, before disappearing in a beam of light and numbers. **

"**The last wonder is a mystery train." Pence said. "A train that only a selected few can see passes over the tracks, despite the station having no record of it." The gang sat on Sunset hill looking for it. They waited for about an hour, when Pence finally decided enough was enough and called this one a trick of the light and the power of suggestion. **

**Just before they left though, Sora was sure he saw something, just out of the corner of his eye, a purple object moving across the tracks. He was about to say something when he remembered Pence's comment about the power of suggestion. That had to be it. **

**Hayner and Olette had gone home early that night. "You know, if all homework was that fun, I wouldn't school that much." He told Olette. She smiled. **

"**Then I'll try to get our homework to be more like that from now on." Hayner returned the smile.**

**Pence and Sora set off towards the Haunted Mansion to investigate 'The Lonely girl'. **

**Sora looked at the mansion suspiciously. "Which window is it?" He asked Pence.**

**The boy pointed a rather large finger at the long window at the left side of the mansion. "Right there." **

**Sora looked up. He didn't see anything at first besides a curtain and could vaguely make out a little black lampshade in the room. Until, Namine appeared at the window, he barely had time to acknowledge her existence, when he was sitting with her in a long white room. He was sat at one end of a table. Namine was at the other. I looked around the room. It was full of drawings. He looked out the window and saw Pence standing completely still. He was inside of the mansion. **

**Sora looked at a few pictures around the room. He recognised who the drawings were of. Mainly they were of Roxas, Naruto and Sakura. Roxas showed up a multiple of times. So did Sasuke. And then there was one of four people. Two of which he recognised, because they had their hoods on their cloaks down. The other two were concealed, although Sora got the feeling one of them was Ansem. "That's me and Axel, but why?" **

**Namine frowned at him, sadly. "Because you are best friends, Sora. Or at least, part of you is." **

**Sora didn't understand. "Part of me?" **

**Namine nodded. "You are made of three parts. You are Naruto's Nobody, yet you have hardly any of his memories inside of you. You have mainly the memories of Roxas and Sakura. Sakura's more than Roxas' because of Eli."**

**Sora blinked. "I'm sorry, but I still don't understand."**

**Namine shook her head. "It doesn't matter Sora. Besides, Diz wouldn't allow me to tell you more." **

"**Diz?"**

"**The man behind this whole operation. The man who put you here."**

"**Put me here?"**

"**Sora, you and I both know that you haven't been here longer than five days."**

"**That's…Who is Naruto? What is a Nobody?"**

"**You know who Naruto is. You've seen his life in your dreams a million times. As for a Nobody, you need to think to how the story ends. You must be getting there by now."**

"…**Naruto gave his life to protect Hinata. He released their two hearts."**

"**That's correct. A Nobody is what is created when a body's heart is taken away from it and it becomes hollow. A Nobody is made of Nothingness and memory. We have no hearts, although some people would beg to differ. Some people say you and I have hearts."**

"**So, I am Naruto?" **

"**No. You are a unique case that you and your Somebody exist at the same time, although this has damaged you both greatly. Naruto is currently asleep and he nor any of his friends will wake without you giving up what is their's."**

"**You're talking like I stole it from them! I didn't ask for this!"**

"**None of us did…Okay, I actually did but that's beside the point. Sora…you're not supposed to be exist!"**

"…**How could you say that! Well, unfortunately for you I do exist! I just don't know why!"**

**Namine sighed, sadly. "Goodbye Sora." **

**Sora found himself right next to Pence, who was writing in his notebook, as if nothing had happened? Had anything happened? Yes. Sora was now sure that this wasn't his own mind playing with him. There was something going on here. Something that he just couldn't comprehend.**

"**A curtain and a lampshade blowing in the breeze." Pence said, sadly. "And I really wanted this one to be true."**

**Sora watched Pence, as he left the sight of the Haunted Mansion. Sora looked back at the window. Namine was looking at him. She looked so sad. No. Sora saw what Namine was truly expressing. It was pity.**

**Sasuke played with a crystal blue orb that he had collected off Sora, the yesterday. Diz was on the computer, as usual. Kakashi had just returned from eliminating the invading dusks, in the Sunset hill area. "We're almost done now boys. There's just Sora's involvement and then Namine's elimination to handle now."**

**Sasuke almost broke his crystal. "What? Eliminating Namine? Why?" He exploded. Kakashi put a hand on his shoulder. A warning.**

"**Sasuke." Diz said, turning in his chair. "We can no longer let Namine live. She has too much power and she knows too much."**

**Sasuke threw his head back and laughed. "She's been helping us! She's not a puppet you can use and then get rid of Diz! She has a heart! She's in love with Roxas! She's even got a Keyblade of Light!" **

**Diz shook his head. "If you will not kill her Sasuke, I will get Kakashi to do it."**

**The silver haired man shook his head. "I'm sorry Diz, but I'm going with Sasuke on this one."**

**Diz glared at them both. "Such impudence." He grumbled, while getting back to his work. "Fine. She may live, but I want one of you to be her guardian."**

"**I'll do it." Sasuke said, immediately. **

"**Very well. Keep her alive and monitor her activity. I suppose Roxas won't be very fond of me, if I send out the task to eliminate his sweetheart." **

**Sasuke smiled, victoriously, before throwing his crystal up in the air again, before making the effort to catch it again. **

"**Don't act so smug." Diz warned Sasuke. "I may very well change my mind." **

"**So, you couldn't bring him back?" Axel sighed, under his superior's questioning. **

"**It's not like that. Namine's messed with his memories. Just give me a little more time with him." The Flurry of Dancing Flames pleaded with his superior, Xemnas. **

**Axel was in the round room, also called The room where Nothing gathers. Along with Axel and Xemnas, also witnessing his begging were Number II-Xigbar, Number III- Xaldin, VI- Saix, VIII- Sephiroth, IX-Luxord, XI- Ruby Moon and XII- Spinnel Sun. **

"**There is no more time Axel!" Xemnas said, silencing Axel's pleas. "If you can't bring him back…then let him join and awaken the original Key Wielders and we'll use them to create Kingdom Hearts." **

**Axel was wounded, as if Xemnas had just stabbed him. His boss was telling him to stand aside and let his friend disappear, just so he could have his precious little Kingdom Hearts. It made Axel sick to his stomach. At that moment, Axel began to realise why Sora had turned on the Organization. They were evil and doing something that was all based on theory. Axel couldn't take it anymore. He was leaving the Organization! **

_**A/N- Yeah, this chapter was kinda boring I'm afraid, but I tried to give it a little bit more of a boost with Axel deciding to leave the Organization. Also, some people might have picked up on something that has come about from me watching and reading WAY too much KH Yoai and now had become a plot point. Oh and you though this story was messed up before. Just you wait! **_


	6. Chapter 6

_Sora's Revelation! _

_A/N- Hey guys. The Sora arc is coming to a close, and we'll soon be in a bunch of different worlds and have the old characters back again, which will hopefully give the story a kick start. But we've still got a couple of chapters left and we have the end of the poll to complete. Then we'll know whether the gang goes to Domino City for Yugioh season 0. Or, will they go to the FMA world. We'll wait and see. So far, it's 50/50. _

Sora…you're not supposed to be exist! Those were Namine's words. Sora couldn't stop thinking about them. He had been close to learning about himself. Too close, he now realised. Curiosity killed the cat. And now, it was about to kill him. Sora now realised he didn't want to know anything more. He was happy being ignorant and not knowing the truth about him and this place. But he could never forget Namine's words…

"Are you listening to me, Sora?" Hayner asked him, waving a hand in front of his open eyes, to make sure he was still alive. 

Sora batted away the hand. "I'm fine. Sorry…just dozing!" 

Hayner looked content, but annoyed with the brunette's answer. 

"We were just talking about how we've only got two days of summer left." Olette helped him. 

"But we're in the same class at school. We'll see each other then." That idea seemed to stun everyone. Then they burst out laughing, at the other's reaction. 

"You're right." Pence said. "For some reason, the whole idea of school seems to have slipped all of our minds." 

Sora's expression suddenly went cold. Why should it of? It was an easy enough of a concept to understand or even just remember. 

When everyone else had gone, Olette cornered Sora, in the usual spot. "What's wrong?" She asked. "Ever since the struggle tournament…no ever since this week started, you've been acting funny."

Sora gave her a shrug, in reply. "I don't know. Maybe I've been replaced by an alien. Or maybe you're just a robot and this whole town is fake, just like in one of those movies." 

Olette gave him an expression that told him what she thought of his sarcasm. "It's a shame those are going to be the last words you ever speak to me with." She said, coldly, turning on the spot and flipping her hair for the mean girl effect. 

Sora cracked a grin. Too bad it didn't suit her. "Shut up." He called back. He heard her laughing, as she walked out. 

Namine finished colouring in her drawing, with a final gold flick of her crayon. It wasn't exactly the colour of Sora's hair, but it was close. The picture detailed of four friends eating a type of blue coloured ice-cream. "It can't happen Namine…no matter how much you wish it." Namine looked up into Sasuke's amber eyes. 

"I know, Sasuke. But still…I want there to at least be a small memory that these events happened. He knew them when he was part of the Organization. Their hearts were connected. Under different circumstances, they really could've been the best of friends."

Sasuke nodded. "I'm aware Namine. I know it's not fair. That none of them would've wished a life of lies on another, even if it meant saving their own…Speaking of which, are the preparations complete?" 

Namine nodded, smiling sadly. "Yes. We're going to see him again today. Have you made up your mind on what to do?" 

Sasuke sighed. "You sound like Diz. What about you? Are you going to join with them or watch from afar." 

Namine hesitated. She had been thinking, and although she desperately wanted to be with Roxas. Just seeing him and making sure he was all right was the best plan of action for now. 

"I'm going with Kakashi. We're going to get together with King Mickey and start preparing for the future. Maybe I'll come and see Roxas some time. Maybe I won't. Maybe I'll wait for this whole thing to be over." 

Sasuke nodded, thoughtfully. "Sounds like you've made up your mind. I suppose I should too." Sasuke left through a corridor of darkness, leaving Namine to hang up what was most probably going to be her final picture. 

"Hey guys! I've got ice-cream." Sora said, walking into the usual spot carrying a plastic bag, which contained four bars of sea-salt ice-cream. The rest of the gang didn't move. They continued to talk to each other. Sora frowned. "Hey! Don't you guys want ice-cream?" He asked, putting on a pout. Still nothing. Sora started to feel anxious. 

"What's wrong with you guys?" Sora said, reaching out a hand to put on Hayner's shoulder. It passed right through Hayner! 

Sora gasped and then stared at his hand. It looked normal. Completely fine. He looked over at Hayner, and the others, who also looked completely normal. Completely unfazed. Sora looked at them, as if they were ghosts, but what if he was the ghost. Sora couldn't touch anything in their hideout. Probably anything in the world. He was the ghost. It was everyone else who were the normal ones.

The gang turned to face Sora. He looked at them and started to cry, he held out his arms half-expecting things to go back to normal and someone to give him a hug, but they just walked right through him. Each one of them. He felt nothing, as they passed. Sora shuddered. This was worse than being a ghost! 

He dropped the bag of ice-cream and hung his head. His salty tears dripped off his nose, and into the bag at his feet. "It was all fake!" 

Sora turned on the spot, eyeing a tall man with red hair, which spiked backwards. "Axel…" That was his name, as Sora remembered. 

Axel gave an approving smirk. "You memorised it. And faster than last time too."

Sora mouthed the words. 'last time?' Axel suddenly frowned. 

"Last time. Sora…what I've told you is true. You were part of something called Organization XIII. However, you realised that the organization was corrupt. You left. A man named Diz wiped your memories and placed you here. In this fake little world. And I was sent to either take you back or leave you here to Diz's mercy. Since the former failed and I have no reason to comply with the latter, I have no choice but to force Diz to give you your memories back and we can leave the Organization together." 

Sora frowned, unsure of himself. He rattled his brain looking for information. "All I can think of…Naruto, Roxas and Sakura… Their lives…you were in Castle Oblivion!" Sora looked up, his eyes glowing with this memory. 

Axel nodded. "That's right. I was sent to Castle Oblivion to make sure the traitors of the Organization were eliminated. Seems kinda redundant now…still those guys were all dicks, so no heavy loses." 

Sora bit his lip. The ability to tell whether or not this guy was lying had activated. Sora could tell that every word that came out of his mouth was true, however…there was something here. Something wrong. And he needed to find out what it was. 

"Axel…?" The red head acknowledged the use of his own name. 

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to get my memories back. But something tells me I shouldn't trust you to get them. You're…you won't give me them all back will you?"

Axel opened his mouth to speak, but Sora looked him in the eyes and he closed his mouth. Sora nodded. He had been right. There was more to this story, than what he had been told. 

Axel sighed and shook his head. "You're too smart for your own good Sora." He said, menacingly. His chakrams appeared in his hands, and three dusks appeared behind Sora. They jumped him and Axel threw his weapons. 

"Rotation!" Sora cried, as a blue sphere enclosed around him, acting as a shield. The Nobodies were disintegrated, as they came into contact with the chakra barrier. Axel's twin weapons found their way back into his hands. 

Sora shook his head and looked at Sora with an angry look in his eyes. "You're an idiot!" He roared, as he readied himself to throw his chakrams at Sora again. Then he froze.

Sora gave the statue a quizzical look. It was just like when Namine had come to him. 

"Sora. Time's up." A deep commanding voice said in his head. Not his conscious. He thought, as he tried to concentrate on the voice. He had a pretty good idea who it was. 

"Diz…" Sora breathed, his voice neutral. Just saying the name, not sure what to make of the mysterious person, who was supposed to be calling the shots here. 

"Very good Sora." Diz said, approvingly, from wherever he was hiding. "Come to the mansion." He commanded, and with that his voice faded away. 

Sora considered what to do. He wanted to get his memories back and he didn't want to stay here, when Axel could wake up at any moment. However, he still felt afraid of what could happen. He analogised his situation to that of a person who knew he was about to die, but still felt that tiny bit of fear, feeling unsure of himself. 

In the end, he left the usual spot and went to the mansion. 

Axel's paralysis ended shortly after Sora's department. "Damn…" He said to himself. "Sora is just as stubborn as ever. Even without his memories…but I need to stop him. He can't join with those Key Wielders." Axel said, jumping up, his eyes shinning with ambition. His soul burning with the aid of his new goal. 

"Eight trigrams! Sixty-four palms!" Sora said, launching himself upwards and taking care of a bunch of Dusks, with his own fists. He then continued his speed and found himself at the gate of the mansion. One problem. There was a huge lock on the gate. 

Sora grinded his teeth. "Why call me here and keep the door locked?" He cried at no one in particular. 

"Please excuse our inhospitality." A voice behind him said. The voice belonged to the one, who had introduced himself as Ansem. 

He held a Keyblade in his hands. The blade resembled Sasuke's Keyblade; Soul Eater. However this blade was straight, it had an angelic and a demonic styled handle and a decorative silver wing on the blade. 

He pointed the blade at the lock and a beam of light made it disappear, then Ansem turned and Sora saw a huge number of Nobodies. Not just Dusks, but other kinds, which went by the name of Creeper and Dancer. 

Ansem gave Sora a push, through the open gates and went right through the mass numbers of lesser Nobodies. 

Inside of the mansion, it was a wreck. There were lesser nobodies inside as well. Sora called on his KeyKunai and set to work on them, slicing them and destroying them one by one. He investigated the gardens out back and the rooms, that he could get into on the ground floor of the mansion, and then he went upstairs. 

The first room he went into looked like a library. There were several book cases around the room and a huge table in the middle. On the table was a sketchpad and a drawing was left unfinished upon it. The drawing was a design of some sort of crest. Three circles were the main component. One circle had a little star inside. The other had a small X shaped picture inside. The last circle was left blank.

There was a pencil right next to the sketchpad, but Sora couldn't think on how to finish the picture. He decided to go into the room across the hall. With a start, he realised, just as he was about to go in, that this must be the white room, that Namine was seen in. Would she be here now? 

"Namine?" Sora asked, peeking around the room. Nobody there. 

Sora took the opportunity of Namine's absence to look at the pictures stuck up on the walls. 

He was attracted to the picture that he saw the last time he was here. The one of four people dressed in black. The one that showed him, Axel, Ansem and the last one who was completely unrecognisable to him. 

Eventually, he tore himself away from that picture and looked at others. He saw a vast amount of pictures, which detailed Namine dancing with Roxas. For some reason, they filled him with a warmish glow. 

Then he saw one that showed himself, Hayner, Pence and Olette atop of the clock tower and eating ice-cream. Sora's eyes dimmed, as they did when he was upset. He moved on to the next and his heart almost stopped. 

The next picture was three individual ones stuck together to tell a story. A brunette was walking in a dark place. A red head tries to stop him, but fails and then the brunette is knocked out by a man, with two faces. 

_Sora walked through Dark City, with a strange feeling about him. He was determined to find Roxas, Naruto and Sakura and join with them. After all, that had been his last wishes. He had just had to deal with Saix. Xemnas wouldn't be very happy when he learnt of the beating of his right-hand man. Still it had to be done, Sora just had to make sure he didn't run into any one of the Organization, before he was able to rejoin with everyone. _

"_You've already decided then." Sora sighed. So much for that, when Axel was around. Then again, he supposed his best friend would have come to stop him. _

_Sora turned to face Axel. "I can't forgive them. After what they did. After what they plan to do. Axel, you should come with me. You'd be good friends with them. They are after all me and…him." Sora said, struggling to remember the name of the friend he had just been forced to eliminate. _

_Axel's expression remained angry. "You'll never get that far! If you turn on the Organization they'll destroy you!" Axel cried. _

_Sora didn't cringe under Axel's shouts and glares. He turned his back on his friend, ready to leave. "No one will miss me." He said, knowing that Nobodies didn't have emotions. They couldn't miss him. _

_Still Axel was hurt. Somehow. It was like after meeting Sora, he had grown a heart. "That's not true!" He called after his friend. "I'd miss you!" _

"Namine? Why choose now to give me back my memories. All of them…well except of those of…him." 

Sora turned on Namine, who was standing by the door, looking expectant. She gave him a small smile and shrug combo. "…It just felt like the right time. And trust me, you don't want to know about Eli." 

Sora nodded, for whatever reason. He took a seat, in which Namine had sat the last time they had met. He remembered almost everything about himself now. He knew why he was here, although he didn't like being used in such a way. He also knew why Axel was the way he was. Sora felt glad, that he had decided to leave the Organization also. But it seemed like his dream of the four being friends would never come true. 

"Namine!" Two large streams of data, portals to get into this virtual world, opened up at both sides of Namine. She gasped as two figures came out. One Diz. The other Kakashi_. _Both looked pissed. Kakashi grabbed Namine and disappeared. 

"Oi!" Sora shouted at Diz, who was the only other one in the room. "What was that for?" 

Diz regarded him with a look that made Sora feel like garbage. "She had done too much. We were hoping you wouldn't have your memories."

"Why?" Sora cried. "I want to join with the three, but what you've done…I'm wondering if what Eli told me was a lie? Maybe I won't exist anymore!" 

Diz shook his head and looked at Sora, his expression showing nothing. "I don't understand…that shouldn't be!" 

"Diz you idiot!" Namine screamed, coming out of a corridor of darkness. Her face was angry and she was directing that anger at Diz. 

"Namine…how long have you been able to create a corridor?" Diz asked, eyeing her in a new light. 

Namine waved the question off. "I told you we wouldn't have to do it this way! You never listened to me, because you didn't understand that I wanted this more than you! I love Roxas! And that means I love part of Sora, as well! You don't believe that Nobodies can feel, but me and Sora can!" 

Namine started breathing heavily. The power it took to execute a successful corridor of darkness and then straight after give Diz the telling off he deserved. 

Diz chuckled. "You've been holding in your true thoughts of me since we met, haven't you? Well…I'm afraid I still don't see Nobodies as creatures that shouldn't exist. Same as heartless. Come Namine. If Sora wants to follow us he can, or we can always just force him." Diz chuckled again, as anger started to boil inside of Sora. 

He made a grab for Diz's coat, but missed. Diz was already back through Namine's corridor of darkness along with her. And he hadn't told her if he was going to disappear or not. 

Sora made his way into the library again. This time he made sure to complete the drawing on the table, realising it to be a message from Namine. He had to complete it. 

He filled it a drawing of the leaf insignia. It was what Naruto's headband showed. The drawing, the table and part of the floor all glowed, as the drawing was finished. It disappeared, revealing a hidden stairway. 

There was a door beneath him. He walked down the stairs and through it, finding himself in a room where there was a huge computer system and a machine set up. 

Sora locked on to the machine. He remembered something. He had been sent to the virtual Twilight Town, after Ansem had beaten him. 

"_So what'll happen to him?" Ansem asked, actually seeming concerned. Diz shrugged, as he moved his way towards his computer system. He started tapping on his keyboard. "I'll have no choice but to hold him here until Namine is finished. This way his pursuers can't find him. I've also had Namine redo Sora's memories; to give him a completely different personality. That way the dusks will have problems finding him as well." _

_Ansem seemed to be deep in thought. He turned away, just before saying "Poor thing." To himself, rather than anyone else. _

Suddenly Sora felt only rage. He had been given a fake personality? Just to make sure he would go back to the Key Wielders? Why were they so horrible? Was it just because they knew nothing about Nobodies? …Or was is something more? 

Sora looked for a way to vent his feelings. He felt his KeyKunai plea to be used. He looked at the computer system. It was fake. Virtual. Destroying it wouldn't have any effect on the real one. 

He plunged the KeyKunai into the machine, countless times, making sure all of the screens were smashed. All of the keyboards broken. Made sure that it could never be salvaged, even by the best mechanic and scientists in the worlds! "Rasengan!" He said, and putting in onto his enlarged kunai for the extra effect. Parts of the machine went flying around the room. 

I entered the next room and found… "Axel." I said, acknowledging. Axel looked at me, surprise flashed across his face and then he went cold and serious. 

"You actually do remember me now? Don't you?" He asked, his voice remaining level, trying to keep his anger all bottled up inside. 

I now realised Namine's true intentions for returning my memories. I would have to thank her. Axel, despite having good intentions, would ruin everything. "I'm not going with you Axel. Don't even ask. You need to realise that they are the only ones that can do this. That can take down the Organization. You've met them. You know what they're like. I wish you would go with them, instead of thinking that anything could ever be the same!" 

Axel looked stunned. He wasn't used to me being this way. I was usually so happy and carefree. But all that changed when I found out the Organization's true intentions. "I can't let you go Sora. Even if I have to knock you out I will not let you leave me!" 

The room filled with flames. Surrounding the two of us. The floor became a field of hot magma. Now I was stunned. I had never seen Axel use his powers to such a level before. Not even with Eli. He really does care for me. 

"Too bad I'm not in the mood." I told him. I reached inside myself and brought out the power that was bottled up inside. The power that Naruto had given me. The power of the Nine-tailed fox! 

A body began to grow around his own. Sora started to feel the pain he suspected would happen, but he was in control. The Nine tails' chakra formed outside of his own body, like a second skin. Only four tails grew out his end. Sora was too afraid to use all nine of the tails, even though the beast was apparently tame. A black mask appeared on his face. His eyes looked like little white holes. _(A/N- I want to make it known that Sora is not undergoing the same transformation Naruto did, when his own blood was used. This is different as Kyubbi was tamed by Naruto and Hinata in the first series.)_

"Nine tailed Fox: Twister!" Sora cried out, and let loose a powerful current of wind using his four tails. 

This was going to be a heated battle!

_(A/N- Next Time- Sora's last stand! The power of a Nobody!_

_So, I hope you enjoyed. Thanks for reading. Please Review!)_


	7. Chapter 7

Sora's last stand! The power of a Nobody!

_A/N- So, this is the final chapter of the Sora arc. Next chapter we will have our regular characters back. In this chapter I will reveal the worlds they will be visiting. I've kept most of them, just had to scrap a couple. Also I need permission from Roxas-kitty to use Mitsuki Lockhart in Halloween Town.)_

"Nine tailed Fox: Twister!" Sora cried out, and let loose a powerful current of wind using his four tails. Axel didn't even flinch as the wind blew past him, just managing to budge him by a few inches.

Sora howled and jumped up, launching himself at Axel, who easily dodged and started attacking him by cutting him with his chakrams. The floor was covered in a hot magma-like substance, but Axel was immune to it and Sora was protected by the second skin made by the Nine tails' chakra. There were also flames all around them, but they didn't bother them at all.

Sora's claws clashed against the sharp spikes of Axel's chakrams. Axel smirked. Fire balls released from his chakrams at short range and Sora got hit with the full impact of the attack. Sora let out an animal cry and began making hand signs. "Nine Tailed Fox: Fire Stream!" Sora cried, before a beam of flames erupted from his mouth.

Axel frowned, baffled. A fire based attack wouldn't affect him. Proven when the attack just sank into his cloak. The confusion had been exactly what Sora had wanted. Axel had been too busy thinking about the attack that he hadn't noticed Sora coming behind him and pushing him towards the other side of the room and collapsing into the flames.

"Give up Axel." Sora said, his voice coming out like an animal's scream. Axel staggered a bit, as he stood up. The last attack had winded him, but he soon regained his balance. He gave his confident grin to Sora.

"No way!" He cried. "Not when my best friend is about to throw his life away!" He answered back.

Sora sighed. Axel just wouldn't listen to reason, even now when he was fighting a losing battle. Somewhere inside of him Sora felt glad that he had had a friend like Axel. Another part of him, told himself that he was being silly and that he couldn't feel. He brushed the thoughts aside and focused himself. If he let down his guard now, Axel could beat him and everything he had done would have been for nothing.

While Sora was thinking, Axel jumped backwards, into the flames and disappeared. Sora let out a growl. A warning for Axel not to try anything.

However, Axel hadn't seemed to understand the message. He fell down from the top of the room, bringing his chakrams into Sora's back and then releasing fire there and then, resulting in Sora lumbering away from Axel, with his second and his first skin penetrated and burnt.

Axel advanced on Sora, seeing this as his chance. To make sure he wasn't caught off guard, he surrounded himself in flames. This way, Sora couldn't hit him with any attacks close range, without hurting himself. Axel wanted to rap things up, before too much damage came to Sora, but the guy was being persistent.

Sora charged Axel, despite being in a lot of pain. Axel gave him a sympathetic look as if to say. 'Please stop, it's over.' Sora gave off a fierce growl, as if to say. 'Screw You!'

Axel had no choice, but to attack his best friend even more and suffer through Sora's cries of pain. Sora collapsed on the ground, panting heavily. He seemed to be bleeding and Axel had to look away, to avoid eye contact with his own handiwork.

"Are you done?" Sora breathed. He had removed his mask and his voice had returned to normal.

"That all depends on you." He answered, coldly, to which Sora chuckled.

"Guess that's a no then." Sora jumped away. Axel had made the mistake of turning away and forgetting all about the powerful healing properties that the Nine Tails possessed.

Axel shouted at Sora, criticizing his stupidity. Sora shook his head and started to draw in his remaining chakra in his hands. The chakra was mainly the very dense and strong type of the Nine Tails. The ball of chakra was some sort of Rasengan, but different to anything Sora had used before. It was a lot heavier than a regular Rasengan. In fact, Sora could barely hold it. He positioned his arms as if to throw it.

"Tailed Beast Rasengan!" He cried, just before the launch. Axel didn't stand a chance, but he still smiled, slightly. Without the mask, he could see just how much Sora wanted to go back to the three key wielders. Sora was no ordinary Nobody. He had known that since the beginning, maybe this was how Sora would become whole. Axel took comfort knowing that.

When Sora's and Axel's eyes met, an understanding went between them. They remembered their times eating ice-cream and enjoying the sunset and the two made a resolve right there and then. They were going to take out the Organization.

However, Sora wanted to do this through his Somebody and Axel wanted to do this with his best friend. Despite this, one thing was for certain. Their destinies were intertwined.

The Tailed Beast Rasengan hit Axel square in the stomach. He gasped, as all of the air was knocked out of him. The flames died down, almost immediately. Axel was barely able to stand, but that was something he could easily recover from. Sora was glad he hadn't hurt Axel too badly. He allowed his second skin to disappear and he felt tired almost instantly.

Axel smirked at him, after lifting his head to look at his friend. "We'll meet again. I'm sure."

Sora nodded, finally smiling his old goofy smile. "I'll be waiting, Axel." He told his friend. Axel shook his head and smiled, as if the whole thing amused him. He opened up a corridor of darkness and disappeared from the mansion.

Sora's eyes filled with tears. He collapsed, partly due to exhaustion, partly due to his heart aching. This was it. Axel couldn't make him go back. He was going to give up his life to bring three people he didn't even know out of a deep sleep. His eyes stung and he was hurting, from his injuries as well, but he got up and pressed on. He knew he was doing the right thing, so he washed doubt from his mind.

Sora travelled through some more corridors, until he had found a room bathed in pure white, just like Namine's. Inside of the room, there was three huge pods. A memory flashed through his mind. Roxas, Sakura and Naruto entering the pods, so that they're memories could be restored easily. The pod in the centre held Roxas. The one of the right held Sakura and that meant the one on the left held Naruto. His somebody.

Diz was standing in the room. Sora supposed that he was there to make sure the process went smoothly, but he still had a few bones to pick with Diz and was grateful that he had decided to show his face.

"Finally. The Key Wielders will awaken. Two and half years they have been sleeping for. It's about time, they awaken." He said, in a very high-and-mighty voice.

Sora rolled his eyes. "That's why I'm here." He told Diz. "Sorry I'm late, but at least I'm here now. I understand what I need to do." Sora spoke in a way that made it clear that Sora was not a person to be looked down upon. He was the key to the whole thing.

Diz nodded, acknowledging the Nobody's role in this whole thing. "I thank you, Sora. People such as Sasuke and even Kakashi, now, believe that you can feel emotions like a normal person. I can't say I completely agree with them, but I am thankful for you and I apologise for using you in such a way."

Sora nodded and smiled. He thought it was time to ask something that had been on his mind for some time now. "Diz. You have a grudge against Nobodies, don't you? What happened to make you so…bitter?"

The question caught Diz by surprise and it showed. He let out a low chuckle. "Yes. I have a grudge against Nobodies. Particularly Organization XIII. The first few members of the Organization were once, as Somebodies, my apprentices. But they began to study the darkness of the heart, and soon they became heartless. Xemnas exiled me to the Realm of Nothingness. A place, as the name suggests, that has nothing there. A human cannot survive there, under normal circumstances. I was only able to survive, because I vowed I would destroy the Organization. My wanting for revenge kept me alive. Maybe it will do the same for you." Diz concluded, thoughtfully.

Sora knew Diz didn't really think that would work, but Sora liked that little bit of hope the words gave him. Diz disappeared into the realm Twilight Town. The three pods opened in a grand manor, which made them look like flowers. Sora closed his eyes. "All of you guys. I want you to look after my friends and be nice to Axel. He can be a bit of a dick, but he's got a good heart. And most of all, I want you to end Organization XIII!"

Light surrounded Sora and he smiled. "It looks like, maybe, a few people will miss me!" He said, before the light covered him completely.

At that moment, people around the worlds suddenly remembered the three Key Wielders. People around the world began to smile, all but one redheaded man, who was crying at the top of a cloak tower, eating a bar of ice-cream.

A purple train pulled up in the Twilight Town station. It was the same train that was known as the sixth wonder. 'The Ghost Train Mystery.' The door slid open and a short figure stepped out. He had weird shaped ears, and was obviously not human. He wore a black cloak. His name was Mickey Mouse or King Mickey.

Three pairs of eyes slowly flickered open. Their pods opened up and they all stepped out, instinctively. The three people looked at each other. Two boys and one girl. Their eyes were hazy and glazed over for a moment and then they suddenly came to life.

Roxas looked around. He was in a pure white room and he could sense Namine. When Roxas had gone to sleep, he had hoped the process would have been quick and he and Namine could have been together. Even from looking around in the first room, he was in, since his awakening, that proved not to be the case.

Roxas could feel a variety of different powers in the room, from people who had been here previously. He could recognise about five presences. However, he only knew two. Namine and Sasuke's. Something had happened to the world, while they were sleeping and Roxas didn't like it.

Finally, he came to look at his friends. They were fawning over each other and for awhile, Roxas couldn't understand what was going on. Then as the two turned towards him, he realised. Sakura and Naruto were much older than they were when they had gone to sleep. That meant that Roxas was also much older. Sakura had Time reveal the amount of time they had been sleeping for was 30 months. Two and a half years.

This fact took awhile to settle in. The memory restoration process was only supposed to take a few months, but to have taken this amount of time was unreal.

"Do you think it was because of us?" Sakura asked. The boys noticed that her voice had lost it's girly highness and she now sounded much more like a women. Sakura had grown taller was probably at her full height now. Her face had lost some of the puppy fat that it had and her cheekbones shaped her face nicely. Her hair had grown slightly longer and some of the strands of her hair now touched her neck. Like the boys, she was dressed in the same clothes that she had fallen asleep in and they were slightly too small on her.

"Who knows? But a couple of years or keeping our memories of that time is worth it, right?" Naruto answered. Roxas and Sakura thought that Naruto was pleased with the growth spurt he obtained, while sleeping. He had now gone from the smallest of their group to the tallest, beating Roxas' new found height by several centimetres. His hair hadn't grown much, and was still quite short and spiky. He seemed to have filled out and his clothes were close to bursting.

"No. Even if we hadn't interfered. Something else was going on. I have more memories than I seemed to have when I entered Castle Oblivion. There's something else going on here. Something happened when we were asleep. Someone's story was told and I'm afraid to say we slept right through it." Roxas said, his voice still retaining his deep and serious tone. Naruto rolled his eyes and Sakura laughed. They were glad to see Roxas' poetic style hadn't disappeared.

Roxas had grown slightly, but not as much as Naruto. He was more muscular than before and he had to take his jacket off, or it would rip. That left him with the tight fitting black shirt underneath. Sakura made a low whistling sound and Roxas started blushing.

In all the serious, possibly the most important fact dawned upon them. They had skipped the worst years of puberty. Naruto and Roxas were grinning like fools and Sakura was singing with glee.

They three decided to get out of the white room and began exploring the place where they had been sleeping for two and a half years. There was a huge basement, which seemed to also serve as a laboratory of some sort.

The three arrived up and saw that the place had been in a few scraps. There were things laying on the floor, and it seemed as the people living here had left in a hurry. Roxas found a room and almost cried. The room was long and white. It had a couple of pictures on the walls, but most of them seemed to have been torn down. On the table there was a little wooden doll, which Roxas recognised as something Sasori had created for Namine. It looked exactly like her and Roxas decided to take it with him.

Then he looked at a picture of himself, Namine and Xion dancing. He smiled, sadly. He knew Namine had been here and this was her wish. For the three of them to be happy together. "This world is so cruel." He said, before pocketing the picture and wiping his tears.

Naruto and Sakura had been looking around, but neither had found anything particularly useful.

The three travelled outside and then examining the outside of the building. They gasped at the familiar sight. It was the mansion of Twilight Town.

"We're in Twilight Town." Roxas noted. "This is my home world." He said, more to himself rather than anyone else.

The other two nodded. Naruto remembered his times exploring the memory version of Twilight Town, so he knew the world. He led the other two through a forest and they arrived in the centre of a huge court. It had a tram station to one end. Houses and shops were spread about the town. Naruto said that there was this whole stage for some sort of local battle tournaments. And at the top of the hill was a clock tower and a train station called Station Heights.

Roxas breathed in the sights of his home world. He had suspected that he had come from a more ordinary background than Sakura or Naruto, but was pleased to see that he had once lived in a modern world.

The three decided to go through the Sandlot and found six teenagers about to pick a fight. The Key Wielders decided to investigate.

"We could so kick your ass in anything, Seifer!" A blond haired guy yelled. He seemed to be defending his two other friends. A chubby guy called Pence and their friend Olette. The words were directed at another blond haired boy, who had a scar down his face. He had two other friends with him. Rai and Fuu. Together, the three were quite intimidating.

"Uh…what's going on?" Naruto asked. The six other teens turned their attention to the new arrivals. Seifer bared his teeth in a confident smile.

"I don't believe I've seen you guys before." He said, coming over to greet them. "You know, you two guys seem pretty cool. Why not join my crew. You're new right? I can show you all the sights." He told Naruto and Roxas, cockily. Seifer turned Sakura away and told her to play dress-up with Olette.

"That jerk!" Sakura cried, running to go and slap him. The emo girl, Fuu, who was one of Seifer's cronies saw the assault coming and blocked it.

Then the big guy, Rai came over. "Nobody hurts Seifer, y'know?"

Sakura backed away from the two of them and Roxas and Naruto got out of Seifer's greasy clutches and went back to Sakura. "Oi!" Seifer yelled at them. "Don't turn your back on me! I'm head of the Twilight Town Disciplinary Committee! I can make your life a living hell!"

Roxas cocked an eyebrow. "So if we don't be your friends, you'll bully us? How old are you?" He taunted, to which the five people behind him burst out laughing.

Seifer's face burnt red. "Oh yeah! I bet I can beat you at any game, any time!" He cried out.

Roxas smirked. "Making up for your obvious flaw, by trying to make sure you are better than that person in a particular area. You're a physiatrist's dream come true." Roxas said.

Seifer couldn't handle it any more. "That's it. I'm challenging you to a street struggle!" He said. The Twilight Town kids seemed to think this was pretty serious, but Roxas and his fellow Key Wielders hadn't a clue what was going on.

"Okay…but what is a street struggle?"

Hayner had taken Roxas under his wing, after he had dealt with Seifer the way he had. He explained that a struggle was a match, where two people were given bats and then were forced to wear suits, covered in Velcro which allowed the balls to stick on. The object of the game was to knock off all of your opponent's balls, before he knocked your's off. It was all incredibly simple.

Roxas was given a blue bat and Seifer stood in his corner, with his own bat. Roxas frowned at not being able to use his sword, but he supposed if he used his X-Blade, he could really hurt Seifer, and although the guy was a dick, he didn't want to put him in the hospital.

The match started and Seifer came right at him. Roxas pouted some more. He wasn't even that good of a fighter. He seemed all about an offensive style, which worked well for amateurs, but when you got better, you learnt there was a lot more than that to fighting.

Roxas held up his bat, at an angel so it hit Seifer's fingers when he swung the bat down. The result was Seifer letting go of his bat. From there, the match was over. As Roxas had seen, the rules of a Struggle tournament didn't say anything about not being able to take your opponent's bat. With two bats in his hands, and Seifer had nothing to defend himself with. All of his balls were knocked off in seconds.

Seifer, Fuu and Rai were all in shock. Roxas didn't even look at his defeated opponent. He just walked away from the scene, despite Seifer's protests.

Seifer wasn't going to have that. He picked up his bat and ran at Roxas, while his back was turned. He raised his bat and was about to swing, when his chin was elevated by a golden blade tip. "Try anything like that again and see where it gets you." Roxas growled, before removing his X-Blade from Seifer's chin. He made sure to leave a small cut on Seifer's chin before turning away again.

Seifer turned to face his friends and his eyes went wide open. Guys in silver jumpsuits were heading right for them, and there was loads of them. A high pitched yelp escaped his throat before he, Fuu and Rai made a run for it. Hayner, Pence and Olette stood back, while the Key Wielders took their places, ready for battle.

"They're lesser Nobodies." Roxas said, analyzing the enemy, who was made out of Nothingness and memories.

Sakura made a face. "There's a lot more than I would have expected. A bit much for our first fight after a two and a half year sleep, don't you think?"

Naruto shook his head. "These guys aren't too tough. Not that much stronger than your average shadow heartless. Besides, it's good to be thrown in the deep end. That way you're pushed to do your very best. I'll show you. Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

Naruto and his clones took up the task of fighting first. They first tried for a frontal approach and attacking them, with their Key kunais. But it was obvious, almost from the start, that this was not going to work. The lesser Nobodies, known as Dusks, were incredibly fast and agile. They even had the ability to walk upside down in the sky for limited amounts of time.

Naruto cursed at his own incompetence and began making hand signs. His clones copied. "Ice style Release!" They all cried. Around each of the clones, an explosion of ice styled chakra was created. The dusks by the clones were all frozen solid, by the end of the assault, they were no more than little snowflakes.

The blond ninja came back, smiling. "See? Easy. Just a bit quick, that's all."

Sakura smirked, boldly. "I'll remember that." She promised him. "These guys are mine." She touched Naruto's shoulder, tagging him out of the fight. Both the boys turned around to see another group of dusks heading towards them. "Dash!" She yelled, not even needing to hold the card anymore. "Sword." With Li's powers now almost gone, Sakura had lost some of her sword wielding abilities. Also, she now held a rapier sword, but she seemed in better control and more confident with the new blade, so the two factors cancelled each other out and Sakura showed she was still a top-notch swordswoman.

With the powers of the Dash card, Sakura was able to move at incredible speeds and quickly took out the Nobodies, despite their good speed and agility.

Sakura hesitated, making sure of another hoard of Nobodies. Sure enough, another came and another. There were huge numbers of them. Sakura was about to fight again, but Roxas put his hand on her shoulder and told her not to get involved unless he needed it.

The X-Blade was Roxas' new Keyblade. Previously, he had wielded two, but as he learnt of his Twilight powers he had come to control the strongest Keyblade there was. In addition to that, during his time in Castle Oblivion, he had learnt many new spells and also had reached a new level of strength when handling both his light and dark abilities.

Roxas was fast and the dusks seemed to have found trouble with him. When they tried to make a grab for him, Roxas would simply appear behind them and attack them with his blade. Along with that, Roxas' new abilities allowed him to rule the Nobodies. "Fire!" He cried, wiping out all the dusks that surrounded him, as flames burst from both ends of his blade and he started spinning it.

"Blizzard!" He shouted, freezing the Nobodies in his path.

"Thunder!" He added, making storm clouds appear above his frozen enemies and watching as they were shattered by bolts of electricity.

Roxas smirked as the last of the Dusks were slain by his blade. The three key wielders waited and breathed a sigh of relief when no more came.

Hayner, Pence and Olette marvelled at the three's strength. "Wow, man! That was so awesome. Where did you get powers like that?" Hayner asked, gazing admiringly at Roxas' blade.

"We were born with them, I suppose." Roxas said, awkwardly. He wasn't sure where his powers came from but he supposed that was the best answer to give.

Hayner nodded, enthusiastically. "Wow! You guys are like super heroes. That jerk, Seifer, didn't know what he was dealing with, challenging you like that. Hey! You're new here, right? Maybe I can show you around. Where are you guys heading? What are you doing?"

The Key Wielders looked at each other. They didn't know what they were doing or where they were going. Without their gummie ship, they had lost their main transportation, although Roxas could always create a Corridor of Darkness. Even still, they wouldn't know where to begin going. A lot could happen in two and a half years and they weren't sure what was going on in the world, concerning Organization XIII or the Heartless. Still the way Hayner and his friends were looking at them was almost creepy. It wouldn't hurt to have a good look around Roxas' home world.

The six teens had reached Station Heights when they ran into trouble again, and plans of exploring the rest of Twilight Town were cancelled. Another group of Dusks were waiting for them. The three Key Wielders were pretty wasted from their last battles, so they came to the conclusion of combining their powers. "Trinity Attack!" They cried.

"Power." Sakura cried, summoning out a pink girl, who contained enormous strength.

"Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Naruto cried, but performing the technique on Roxas, instead. The Roxas's jumped into the air, along with Power.

"Oathkeeper Thrust!" The Roxas's cried. Their X-Blades glowed for a moment, before a white energy encircled them so they looked like lances. Power threw down each and every lance with a huge amount of power that sent shockwaves throughout the area, when they hit the ground. The dusks never stood a chance. They fell, helplessly.

Roxas returned to the ground. His clones had vanished and Power had returned to her card form. The three were out of practice and getting tired. When another group of dusks appeared, they began to curse.

How were they going to get out of this one?

_(A/N- Ah. Sorry if it seemed like I lost the will to live in this chapter. I did this while I was feeling ill and was coming to and fro it due to that. But, at least I got it done. Thanks for Reading. Hope you enjoyed. Please review. Next time- The plot thickens. New characters, new outfits and a new adventure!_

_The worlds appearing in this story, in chronological order are:_

_Simulated Twilight Town - Destiny Isles - Twilight Town - Mysterious Tower - Hallow Bastion - Land of Dragons - Beast's Castle - Olympus Coliseum - Disney Castle - Timeless River - Port Royal - Agrabah - Halloween Town - Domino City (Yu-gi-oh season 0) - Pride Lands - Dark City (Soul Eater) - Space Paranoids - Tomoeda - Konoha - World That Never Was. (This does not include more visits to the one place.) _


	8. Chapter 8

The plot thickens!

_A/N- It's been awhile, hasn't it people? Or maybe it just seems like that way to me. So, just taking a look over the story. It's barely started! But I have wrote 30,000 words and taken like seven months. One for each chapter, I suppose. I'm taking a lot longer with this than I would like. But I am over halfway through 'Roxas Vs The World'. I don't really have anyone I'm betaing at the mo. So, I should be able to focus more time on this. Anyway, looking back on the first seven chapters, I have to say they were sort of all right. I hope I can do better now that I have the original group to use. Be prepared for some plot twists coming up!_

The three were out of practice and getting tired. When another group of dusks appeared, the gang started to curse. How were they going to get out of this one?

Roxas stood up, panting. He was physically drained, but he was going to try and protect the home he never knew he had with every last bit of power he had. He readied himself then hesitated, as if having second thoughts. A smirk spread across the blonde's face. "Good evening…your majesty." Roxas said, much to the confusion of the onlookers and his friends.

Suddenly a dark shape shot out from behind the Nobodies. The creature landed with perfect balance. "You're wearing an Organization cloak? You must be indulging yourself into the darkness." Roxas said, in a more serious tone.

The creature nodded, taking his hood off. The creature was a mouse and his whole face seemed to be made up of circles. This was King Mickey of Disney Town. A key wielder and the person who helped all of the other key wielders seal the Door to Darkness, when it was opened by Ansem's doing. The reason why Roxas was interested in him was because King Mickey was the last one, to his knowledge, to have seen Sasuke.

"That's right Roxas." King Mickey answered. "You should consider wearing one yourself."

Roxas shrugged. He didn't feel like wearing one any time soon. "How much power do you have?" King Mickey asked him.

Roxas had to consider for a moment. "About enough for a small diversion attack and opening up a large enough corridor of darkness to get all these people out of here." Roxas had already figured at King Mickey's intentions and knew that it was the best choice of action.

"But after that, I'm not gonna have enough strength left to open another corridor to get me, Sakura and Naruto out of here." Roxas said.

King Mickey had that bit covered, as it happened. He threw Roxas a red hand-made pouch. Roxas didn't bother to check the contents. He knew what he needed would be in it.

"King Mickey. What happened to Sasuke?" Roxas asked. He hadn't seen his friend in almost three years and he missed him terribly.

King Mickey looked back at Roxas, he face seemed to be full of pain, as if he didn't want to think about Sasuke. Roxas' eyes bulged and his mouth took the shape of a small 'o'. King Mickey saw the Keyblade wielder's expression and shook his head. "He's not dead." The mouse assured him. "It's just complicated right now. You'll understand soon, I'm sure. But not now."

Roxas didn't how to respond to that. He looked past the King and remembered that he was supposed to be getting everyone away from the Nobody threat. "Okay, your majesty. Let's go!"

Roxas walked beside Mickey, both raised their Keyblades at the Nobodies. "Sign of faith!" The small king cried. From the tip of his Golden Keyblade, a white light shot out, landing at the Nobodies feet and quickly expanding, into a huge tornado of light sucking all the Nobodies inside.

"Thunder!" Roxas cried and on his command the sky turned grey and a bolt of lightning shot from the sky turning the captured Nobodies to dust in an instant. With that Roxas turned on his tail, before another group of Nobodies could replace the ones that had just been defeated, and covered all of the remaining people, except from King Mickey, in darkness. Some cried out as the unique pulling sensation got to them and sucked them into the darkness.

King Mickey smiled, thankful that the kids had gotten away and pulled his hood back up as another group of Nobodies came to attack him.

"What was that all about?" Hayner asked the three Key Wielders. He and his friends Pence and Olette stayed with the group of key wielders, while Seifer and his group had run off. The six were at the train station- Station Heights. It was at the very top of Twilight Town. Hayner even mentioned that you could get up to a ledge near the top and see the whole of Twilight Town from there. Roxas really wanted to see it.

"Those were Nobodies." Naruto answered. "Empty shells of people who have become heartless. They're under the control of the Organization. We hope they should go away if we leave this place. That's why we're getting this train." He gestured towards the purple one pulled up beside them.

The group had arrived and paid money for train tickets, with the money inside of the pouch that King Mickey had given Roxas. There was also a blue crystal orb inside of it, which Roxas kept for himself. All three of the Key Wielders said it looked, strangely, familiar, but no one could remember where from exactly. The man at the ticket booth had told them to board the train on platform one. He had a blank expression on his face, when he had said so. Nobody knew what to make of that. The gang figured that the train would wait for them, since Sakura did some exploring and found their to be no driver on board.

"And you guys…you're Key Wielders. People from different worlds who use these Keys to help free the world…right, worlds, from evil?"

"That's pretty much it." Naruto answered. He was the one talking with Hayner, while Sakura was dealing with Olette's and Pence's questions. Roxas had gone up to the clock tower's top.

When he finally arrived up there, he sat right on the ledge and looked at the city before him. It was breathtaking and made even more so by the setting sun making everything glisten. He smiled, not just at the scenery, but for what he was feeling. He felt a lot of familiar people who had sat here at least once. It seemed like some were regulars, whether others had only come for the one time and some were still to leave.

Roxas shook his head and chuckled. "Look Sasuke. I don't know what's happened in the time that I've been getting my memories put straight, but I can guess. I think there's been a lot of heartbreaking things. And to make it worse, I think a lot of that stuff has to do with me. When I sit here, I can feel…you and Namine. I can even feel Axel, another Nobody and…a replica? I have no clue why you won't speak to me, why you won't even let me see you. But I will find out, so don't strain yourself trying to keep me from the truth." He finished and felt his friend's presence leave him.

Roxas' eyes dropped a little. "But it sounds like there's a lot to find out."

"Goodbye!" The three called from out their train's window, as it slowly began its trek to wherever it was going. The three from Twilight Town returned with a few waves.

Once the train had really taken off, Roxas, Naruto and Sakura exchanged an upset look. "We only knew them for awhile…so why do I feel so sad?" Sakura asked, what everyone was thinking. They couldn't understand the feeling, but decided to put their confused emotions to the back of their minds, as they looked out the windows to find themselves being surrounded by the blackness of space and an aurora hanging overhead.

Sakura thought the scene was beautiful. Naruto said it was nice. But Roxas didn't think it compared to Twilight Town's sunset and laid down his head, trying to get some sleep, hoping his dreams could explain all of troubles.

"He's gone, Diz. And we're going too." Sasuke and Namine were in the mansion, in the real Twilight Town. Diz and Kakashi were staying here for a bit longer, working on something that could help defeat the Organization and keeping tabs on the worlds from here.

Sasuke and Namine were going to be following the Key Wielders to each world they went to, just making sure that they were kept safe.

"We'll meet again. Don't worry." Kakashi said, the way his cheekbones were positioned and the twinkle in his eyes told Namine and Sasuke that he was smiling, despite his mouth being covered up.

Sasuke and Namine nodded and disappeared through a corridor of darkness.

The world was surprisingly small. It was no more than an oddly shaped tower and a garden. The tower was crooked and a golden or maybe brass colour. It was topped with a blue cone shaped roof, which was, like the train, decorated with moons and stars. The garden was covered in trees and the sky was dark, but filled with stars.

At the front entrance of the tower was a huge, portly creature. A dog? No, a cat. He was wearing an armour coloured in blue and purple. Underneath was a red short sleeved shirt, with a vertical pink stripe descending down from his neck. He also wore navy blue and white sneakers and two straps were keeping them secure. His pants were also navy, but the lower legs were purple and there were two huge pouches on both sides of the pants. A giant zipper ran up the middle of his pants. The creature was peeping into the tower. That struck the Key Wielders as odd.

He chuckled, just as the three walked in on him. "I sent some of my lackeys inside." He said. Did he know the Key Wielders were there, or was he just talking to himself?

"Word is the master of this here tower is a real powerful sorcerer, which would make him the perfect bodyguard for me!" The cat creature boasted.

"There's something familiar about him." Roxas muttered, eyeing the suspicious character's back.

"See it doesn't matter how tough he is." The cat continued. "Once he's a heartless, he'll do whatever I say!"

The Key Wielders tensed up and summoned out their weapons. They had taken their time on the train to recover from their previous fight and the three were ready to go. "So you're a heartless commander?" Sakura asked, innocently.

"Yeah! I sure am! Heartless are those things that are made up of the darkness in people's hearts." He said, still not realising that anything was wrong.

"With all of these strong heartless that I'm getting for her, my dear Maleficent is going to rule everything!" He boasted. Sakura had decided to take charge of this guy.

"Wow! The Maleficent?" Sakura asked, faking amazement. "Well, I haven't seen her since…well since I defeated her."

The cat creature turned around and looked at the sixteen year old girl in disbelief. "What are you talking about?" Then he looked at the Key Staff in her hands. "You're a Key Wielder?" Then his eyes looked at Naruto and Roxas. "All of you?" He started to whimper, but then he regained his cool.

"You! You're the reason why Maleficent hasn't contacted me in so long! Why I can't find her! Heartless!" He screamed, thrusting his fists into the air. About six shadow heartless came up from the ground.

Roxas actually laughed. "It's just as I thought. The darkness in your heart isn't really that great. You could be good."

The cat sneered. "I am the great Pete! I can summon a huge amount of heartless, but most of them are taking care of this Yen Sid guy."

The key wielders rolled their eyes, obviously not believing his excuses. "I'll take care of this." Sakura said, pulling out a talisman. She still had a fraction of Li's powers, as Naruto still had a fraction of Hinata's powers. "Power of the Gods! Release the light! Fire! Water! Earth! Wind! Lightning!" Five streams of energy burst from Sakura's talismans, twirling and each creating a type of vortex. Although Pete was able to summon out more heartless, all of them were destroyed by Sakura's display of power.

Pete was scared. That much was confident. But he was also arrogant and proud. "This isn't over. I've just got more important things to do than to waste my time dealing with you brats!" He said, before opening up a corridor and fleeing.

The inside of the tower was grand. As we were going up, we found that they're didn't seem to be any other rooms except for the one at the very top. Sakura suggested the idea that if Master Yen Sid was a powerful sorcerer, then he could probably create the one path way so visitors didn't get lost.

The top room was large and almost circular in appearance. There were large holes in one side of the wall, in the shapes of moons and stars. There were books lined across shelves in the room and a huge table right in the middle of the room. Three small seats were positioned on one end, while on the other sat a man dressed in blue, with cold hard eyes and a beard that stretched down to his waist. He was strangely intimidating. This must have been the tower's master. Yen Sid. He waved a hand at the Key Wielders to come in.

Once they were seated, Yen Sid began to speak. "So, you are the new Key Wielders. Sakura Avalon, Naruto Uzumaki and Roxas Kamikaze." Roxas was surprised. He had never heard his last name before, unlike Naruto and Sakura who could remember their's. He hadn't been so lucky and was simply called Roxas.

"Where to begin?" Yen Sid said, more to himself than anyone. "Let's see…have you seen the King yet?"

Roxas took upon himself to answer. "Yes we did, Master. He helped us get away from a mass group of Nobodies. He's been busy, hasn't he?"

Yen Sid nodded, if he was impressed by Roxas' deductive skills, he didn't let it show. "That's right. I'm guessing he didn't tell you much of what's happened in the past two years, has he…no, I didn't think so.

"You have another perilous journey ahead of you. I know that you all want to return home after finding the ones you hold dear, but you'll soon see that everything is connected. I'm sure you'll find your friends along your way."

"I have a question." Naruto said, holding up his hand, as if he was in school. "Heartless are still around. Why is that? Is it because of this Pete guy?"

"Naruto. If you cast your mind back to that day in Hallow Bastion. You'll remember that you never succeeded in destroying the heartless manufacturing machine. Pete has done a good job of recruiting new heartless controllers. But aside from that, you must remember that the heartless are darkness made real. There is darkness in every heart, so there will always been heartless and since there are heartless controllers, there are mass amounts of heartless. Emblem and Pureblood."

Nobody looked happy to hear those words. It just meant more pests to stomp on.

"The other type of enemy, as I'm sure you know, are the Nobodies. Empty vessels, which act on their own will. They are made of Nothingness and although they pretend they can feel. This is only a ruse- they only pretend to have hearts. You must not be deceived." While Master Yen Sid said this, he looked directly at Roxas, who frowned in reply. He was quite sure that some Nobodies did have emotions. Namine and possibly even Axel were examples of this.

"And as I'm sure you are aware. There are Nobodies so powerful, who have become so strong. They have taken up a human exterior. These Nobodies call themselves the Organization or Organization XIII. Right now, the Organization has only eight members. You destroyed Sasori. Axel, another Nobody, destroyed Kisame and I suppose I should say that Axel has disbanded from the Organization, following the lead of his fellow member Sora." The name sounded so familiar to the Key Wielders, but they couldn't remember ever hearing it. It was the same sort of feeling they got when thinking about Hayner, Pence and Olette. So odd.

"Sasuke…" Yen Sid continued, attracting Roxas' attention. "…defeated a member known as Itachi. He was in Castle Oblivion at the same time as you." That just confirmed what Roxas had already suspected.

"The journey you are about to undertake is a dangerous one. And at your current level of power, you will not have enough strength to fight. Which is why, I have decided to give to you, each, an outfit full of powerful magic, which can use your own powers and turn it into something more physical. Besides that, I believe the clothes you are in right now, are a bit small." Yen Sid allowed himself a chuckle, before indicating to a door to the right of us. "Inside of there, you'll meet some nice women who agreed to help me make these outfits. Five were created. One for each of you. The King. And Sasuke, although he has not taken his. I would like you to deliver it to him, if you ever do meet up with him. Oh and Sakura. I believe you are familiar with the women."

Leaving the three wielders bewildered, they left the room.

Sakura gasped, in delight. Three elderly, plump women, with wings on their backs and all dressed in one particular colour, red, blue and green, were floating and talking with each other. "Flora! Fauna! Merryweather!" Sakura cried out, happily, rushing towards the women.

The three good fairies saw the girl rushing towards them and smiled as she hugged each of them. Sakura made the introductions. "Roxas, I believe you met the fairies, when you came and got me from Enchanted Dominion?"

Roxas nodded, remembering the time when the three had been separated by Ansem. Sakura had bested Maleficent in that world, with the help of the fairies, Prince Philip and Aurora. A princess of Heart.

"But Naruto, I don't think you guys met."

Flora smiled and waved her hand, dismissing any form of introduction that Naruto was about to give. "That's quite all right, dear. We know all about you. Now, as I believe Yen Sid told you. Today we're here to give you your new outfits. Each outfit has been blessed with a magical power. We like to call these powers the Drive Forms.

"Sakura. You have the most drive forms. You can fuse with any one of your star cards and use their powers much more effectively. You can even fuse with more than one card at a time, but it doesn't always work, as the cards don't always fuse together.

"Naruto. You have nine drive forms. One for each tail of Kyubbi, by the time you reach the ninth tail, you will be able to take up Kyubbi's true form and not a mixture of human and beast.

"And Roxas. You have the lowest number of forms. But each of them is very powerful. Oathkeeper form. Oblivion form. Twilight form. Each one will be difficult to use and the forms may go out of control. That goes for all of you. All the forms won't be assessable at the start, but as you grow stronger, you'll learn how to use their powers properly. By that time, I hope you will be able to defeat Organization XIII."

The Drive forms appealed to the Key Wielders, but they realised the solemnness of Flora's voice was a warning for them to be careful.

The fairies each waved their wands and a bright light surrounded each Key Wielder for a moment, before finally dying down.

The Wielders looked at themselves in shock. Their old clothes had disappeared and had now been replaced by something else.

Sakura was wearing a dress fit for a princess. Around her neck was a bracelet, keeping hold of small golden coins? It was difficult to tell. On her head she was wearing a hair band, which had pink trinity symbols at each end of it. She was wearing a short sleeved top with a large pink stone right at the collar and where the sleeves ended and where the top ended was lined with a black stripe. She had two golden bracelets on the one arm. The dress flowed out around Sakura, like a classical dress did. It was mainly white, except for at the bottom of it, which was clearly designed with a red pattern and more pink gems. There was a gap in-between where her legs were showing, to be seen in a pair of simple white trousers. She was wearing sandals, which matched her outfit.

Naruto's outfit hadn't changed so much as Sakura's. It was still a jumpsuit. The jacket was now much more fitting. Wherever the blue bits for the jacket was, were now replaced by back. His collar had turned fully black and his blue sandals were now black, as well as his blue forehead protector.

Roxas' outfit also was barely changed. He was now only wearing the one jacket, which had his signature, black and white theme. The sleeves were now fully chequered, right down to each end. The rest of the jacket was almost fully white. The collar was now much higher now, that the previous had been. It completely covered Roxas' neck, like a winter jacket did. There was a red line on each side of the jacket, that curved upwards starting from just above the very middle of the jacket and ending near his armpits. There were white pockets above the line. And a row of little black Xs going across it. The shirt underneath was almost completely black except for a white symbol right in the middle, which Roxas recognised as his necklace's, which still hung around his neck, unchanged. The black and white on his trousers had been switched, so now the top part of it was white and the legging was black. His shoes looked about the same, however, and didn't seem to have been changed at all. Just cleaned and possibly made bigger.

"Thanks a lot." The Key Wielders said to the fairies. Roxas took Sasuke's outfit for him and turned to leave after being told Yen Sid had a surprise for them.

Sakura was the last to leave, and just as she was about to. She heard a bird. Looking up, she saw a raven holding a black cloak. It looked strangely familiar. The cloak and the bird. The fairies shared her look of wonder and slight confusion, as if they were also trying to remember why the two things looked so familiar. The raven left as swiftly as it had come. Sakura felt drowsy and left the room with a simple 'Goodbye'.

"Come over here." Yen Sid told the Key Wielders as soon as Sakura walked through the door returning to the circular room, which seemed to be Yen Sid's study.

The aged master indicated to his garden. At first there was nothing, until a familiar aircraft filled the sky. "Hey! It's the gummie ship!" Naruto cried out, jumping up and down. Everyone rushed to the window, where the gummie ship was best visible.

"You guys ready to go?" Roxas asked his companions, who nodded, enthusiastically.

Yen Sid held up his hands and shook his head. "Now, now. Just a moment. Because of your previous endeavours, you put the worlds back to the way they once were. They are separate again and the pathways between them have disappeared."

Roxas frowned. "But that means, are only means of transport are the corridors and those are pretty dangerous, especially for Naruto and Sakura."

Yen Sid nodded, understandably. "King Mickey also noticed this. He has his own way of travelling across the worlds. But he suspects that the worlds are preparing new pathways, which you can travel with. However, these pathways can only be opened by unlocking special gates. These gates have taken shape in the most important object of that world. Observe."

Master Yen Sid took off his hat and placed it on his table. It began to glow and light surrounded the hat. The light was almost a pink colour. The hat floated up into the sky. Roxas felt a tug on his X-Blade, just as it he did when a Keyhole was nearby and needed to be sealed. The X-Blade's tip began to glow just as the hat did. The X-Blade pointed to the floor. Roxas' signature necklace symbol appeared on the ground. It was glowing and then light rose up covering Roxas. Inside the light, he saw a twilight sky. It was beautiful. Above the floating hat, a beam of light shot out and formed a glowing Keyhole above it. Roxas knew what to do next and raised his Keyblade. A small beam of light shot out of the tip, until it reached the keyhole. The world exploded into light and then, eventually, died.

"Well done. I have done everything I can for you. Go forth, Roxas, Naruto and Sakura. Everyone is waiting." Yen Sid told them and allowed himself a smile.

"Thank you Master Yen Sid."

"I'm sure we saw something like that cloak and bird before." Fauna said, still in their room.

Suddenly a high and evil sound echoed through the night. "Oh no!" Flora cried.

The fairies didn't know what to do but they fled to Master Yen Sid. They all knew what that raven had been doing. They knew what had happened. Maleficent was back from the darkness!

_A/N- Next Time- The Hallow Bastion Restoration Committee and The Key Wielder Support Society. _


	9. Chapter 9

The Keyblade Wielder Supporter Society!

_A/N- Long chapter title I know. Anyway, I'm quite excited today. The reason for it being, well first, I am off for Summer now, so I hope I can do a lot more work on this, or at least my other stories, so afterwards I can focus more on this. But secondly, and this affects my readers, so read carefully. _

_KNCH2 now has almost four thousand hits and KNCH has even more. Unfortunately, when I was messing around with the chapters of that story, I lost about three thousand hits. So it would have about seven or eight thousand at this point. So, in celebration of that. I'm doing an FAQ. You can ask me questions, and/or you can ask the characters of the KNCH series questions. I do have a few already lined up. But I hope you can give me a few more. Just leave me any questions you have in your reviews. Anyway, on with the chapter!_

"Hey there!" Chip and Dale greeted the Key Wielders, as they entered the gummie ship for the first time in years.

"It's good to see you guys again." Roxas said, giving them both high fives, before sitting down in the captain's seat of the ship.

"Is my room the way I left it?" Sakura asked, after commenting on how Chip and Dale were still as cute as ever. She went and had a look at her room, which had been locked with magic, so the others didn't know why she would have expected anyone to be able to break in.

"Do you still remember how to fly this thing?" Naruto asked, nervously, eyeing Roxas' grip on the steering as he eased his way into the shotgun of the ship.

Roxas smiled. "Sure. It's just like riding a bike, and I remember how to do that." He sounded confident, but of course. He didn't remember how you got the ship off the ground and needed his chipmunk friends to drive the contraption.

"So the world we're going to next is the one where you're heart longs for most, is that right Roxas?" Chip said, his eyes on the…space?

Roxas nodded. "That's pretty much what Master Yen Sid said. Do you know where we're going yet?"

Chip took a moment to answer. "Yeah, I think I do. I just really hope it isn't like the last time we visited." He answered, cryptically, leaving the Key Wielders confused as to where Roxas had made them go.

All soon became clear, however, when a familiar world came into view. "Is that what I think it is?" Naruto cried, looking alarmed.

Sakura nodded, her eyes transfixed on the familiar location. The Key Wielders didn't hold good memories of their time in Hallow Bastion. It was the world in which, Sasuke's body had been overcome by Ansem and also it held significant bad memories for Naruto and Roxas, who had become a heartless and who had lost his love there. Neither boy looked exactly thrilled to see the site.

"But wasn't Leon and the others supposed to be helping out and trying to clean up and repopulate the world?" Sakura asked, the memory of their last moments with the gang from Hallow Bastion resonating in her mind.

Naruto and Roxas both nodded, as the memory came into their minds as well.

"I guess we'll see how well they did." Naruto said, glaring at the world, just before they touched down. What interested Naruto the most about that. They were miles away from the Castle. Instead they seemed to be landing in a shopping district.

"So this place is really Hallow Bastion huh?" Naruto asked, gazing around at the light sky and breathing in a positive atmosphere. The knuckle head smiled. "I guess Leon and the guys did it."

Roxas didn't look very positive, despite it was him who had brought them here. "I don't know about that. Did you see the Castle, when we were landing. It looked about the same as ever. And there's a big barren area around there too. Something tells me that this world's not done yet. There's still a lot of work to do."

Sakura sighed, as they looked around the shops. "You always have to be so negative, don't you?"

The shops seemed to be built on the ruins of some kind of garden, but it was now covered in quickly constructed buildings and for some reason, a giant freezer. A duck was standing in front of it, apparently not impressed.

"Excuse me?" The duck turned and offered Sakura a smile.

"Are you alright lassie?" He asked, he had an accent.

Sakura returned his smile. "Yes, well. I was just wondering if you know a Leon, or a Yuffie?"

The duck gave Sakura a suspicious look, then his gaze wondered to Naruto and Roxas, giving them a small look over before he nodded. "You lot aren't from around here, are you? I thought I heard the sound of a gummie ship engine. Know that sound anywhere, I invented them don't you know?"

The Key Wielders shared a look of surprise. "You invented the gummie ship?" Naruto asked.

The smartly dressed duck nodded. "That's right. With some help from the honourable King Mickey, of course. The name's Scrooge McDuck. I presume you three are the new Key Wielders Roxas, Sakura and Naruto, correct?"

The three nodded, dumbstruck. This man knew quite a lot about the Keys, especially if he was acquainted with King Mickey. Scrooge looked at the teenager's faces and chuckled. "Ay. I've done quite a bit into the research of you Key Wielders. I'm afraid I can't help much anymore, though, in my old age." His eyes held a distain sadness and then within moments they were back to normal. "But anyway, if you're looking for Leon and his gang. They usually hang out in Merlin's place. It's just down this path, it's a pretty large place and it's difficult to miss. The man used his magic to make it back to the way it was before Maleficent's occupation of the area. I just wish he could have done it for the rest of the world." He finished, sadly, leaving the Key Wielders to walk away from the man, who seemed stuck in the past, but as they went, they heard him saying something about ice-cream quite excitedly. Go figure.

"Ahhh. Get off of me, damn heartless!" The person in distress was a girl. One with violet eyes, who was dressed in an unzipped dark grey vest, with a navy tank top on underneath. She was wearing a dark pair of shorts and also had on black knee high socks and tan boots. This girl's name was Yuffie.

"Need a hand?" Naruto asked, bemused, as he watched the wannabe ninja struggle with a group of heartless. She turned to see who was laughing at her and Yuffie's face lit up.

"Hey you guys!" She cried, waving her hands, temporarily forgetting about her attackers. She ran over to hug the three of them. She smiled at them, like a Cheshire cat and the three Key Wielders could tell from experience. "You guys look great! It's so awesome to see you again."

Naruto chuckled. "Well what were you expecting. We're Key Wielders. We always look good." He said, joking. Yuffie laughed and rolled her eyes.

"Well, you look like you're doing pretty well yourself. How are the others?" Sakura asked.

Yuffie beamed at the Cardcaptor. "Yeah. Cloud's still with us, if you can believe it. Although he's…changed. It's hard to explain. You'll see for yourself." She said, ready to return to Leon and the others and then remembering the group of heartless ready to fight, which had been joined at some point by a group of Nobodies.

Yuffie groaned. Suddenly, circles of light travelled under the enemies. Spheres shot up, forcing the foes upwards into the air. "What's that?" Roxas asked, curiously watching the circles of light attack the Heartless and Nobodies again.

"That's Claymore." Yuffie answered. "It's Hallow Bastion's new defensive system. So far, Cid's only got it set up as far as the Castle Gate, but it's pretty handy. It can't really defeat that many enemies, but it can hold them off until one of us in the committee get there."

"Committee?" Yuffie waved her hand, meaning that she would answer the question later. Right now it was time to fight.

"Don't worry about it Yuffie. I'll take care of it." Naruto said, putting a hand on Yuffie's shoulder and pushing her back slightly. Naruto closed his eyes in concentration. "Byakugan!" He cried, his eyes opening to reveal pale pink eyes that could look into your very soul. "Eight Trigrams! One hundred twenty-eight palms!" He cried, putting himself into the gentle first stance and attacking faster than anybody else could keep up with. Within a few moments, the large group of opponents were gone.

Yuffie's mouth was wide open, in shock. Roxas and Sakura allowed themselves a look of surprise as well. It was the first time either of them had seen Naruto use the strengthened version of his most famous Byakugan related move.

Naruto smiled at his friend's faces. "Come on, let's go to Merlin's house." He called, beginning to walk.

Inside of Merlin's house, Cid was typing away on a huge computer, which was obviously not apart of Merlin's home naturally, as the elderly wizard despised technology with a passion. Aerith and Leon were also there, standing beside him. Neither looking like they had changed much. The Key Wielders spotted Cloud, leaning against a wall, not looking particularly interested in what his allies were doing. Cloud did look completely different. He looked older, which wasn't too much of a surprise, but his eyes looked like he had aged decades. His hair wasn't quite as wild, as it had been the last time the group had seen Cloud. He was wearing a black attire, with a silver wolf head badge on it, keeping it together. He had also exchanged his old buster blade for a new one, which looked heavier, stronger and had a better range. Roxas sensed something inside of Cloud that made him frown. Merlin was also in the room, sitting, drinking tea. He waved to the Key Wielders as they came in. No doubt he had been expecting them.

"I'd like to introduce you to the Hallow Bastion Restoration Committee!" Yuffie said, excitedly, with a theatrical wave of her hand.

Aerith turned on the spot, looking ready to jump for joy. "We've missed you." She told them, honestly, smiling her award winning smile.

Cid turned around in his chair. He smirked, despite the wooden stick in his mouth. "Well ain't you all looking well." He said, chuckling.

Leon grinned at the Key Wielders. He had his arms crossed. "I knew it." He said, in a victorious sort of way. Roxas and Naruto couldn't help thinking he must have made some sort of bet that they would visit him soon.

"What do you mean you knew it?" Sakura asked Leon, although Cloud was the one who answered.

"Soon after you left to go and defeat Ansem, everyone forgot about you. And then recently, we all remembered you at the exact same time."

It was clear to the Key Wielders what had happened. "That's because of Naminé. She's Xion's Nobody. Naminé has the ability to manipulate the memories of those connected to us. Our memories were…in turmoil. She helped us, but since she guessed that people would start to question our disappearances, she must have decided to wipe everyone's memories until she had our memories fixed." Roxas stated, sadly, as any though of Namine and Xion made him feel so.

"So that's where you've been this whole time." Yuffie said, more to herself than anyone else in the one room house.

Merlin seemed quite interested. "A person with the ability to manipulate memories. No, wait. A Nobody correct. It seems that all of the developed Nobodies have a particular element that they can control. So that means hers must be memory." He said, taking down notes.

"But this is great. Now we can officially get the other committee launched."

"Other committee?" Sakura voiced what all three of the Key Wielders were thinking.

Leon nodded. "That's right. Yen Sid contacted Merlin, when we all remembered you. He told us that you would only be able to get to one world at a time, judging on where you wanted to go. Also we realised you might need help from locals of the different worlds to help you in your fight against the heartless. We made contact with a bunch of different people.

We did this for a reason. We realise that although going to worlds randomly worked for you the last time, this time around you may not be so lucky. You might need to see who's in danger and get to their world, as fast as you can. That's why we made a new committee, so you could see who needs your help and who doesn't. The Key Wielder Supporter Society!" Leon announced with pride.

The Key Wielders weren't sure what to think of this. Sure it was a good idea and it could be very helpful to them. But questions still arose. "How exactly does this work?" Naruto asked.

"We'll show ya." Cid said, before he began tapping away of his keyboard again. "I can send a copy of this to Chip n Dale for the Gummie Ship, so you can use it whenever." He said, just before the screen before him filled with faces. Some familiar and some new.

"Madison!" Sakura cried, rushing forward to the screen, so she could get a better look at her closest friend from her home world.

"It's great to see you again Sakura." Madison said, smiling.

"Hey pervy sage." Naruto chuckled, greeting his godfather Jiraiya, who was representing Naruto's home world- Konoha.

Roxas noticed a reprehensive for Twilight Town, but decided not to bother to talk to him. There were many faces on the screen and it was hard to decide who to go to first. Eventually he made a decision. "Hey Mitsuki. How's Jack doing?" He spoke to the representative for Halloween Town.

"Hi Roxas. It's good to see you. He's fine, but the guy's totally obsessed over Christmas of all things." She laughed.

Next an unfamiliar face caught his eye. Well when he said unfamiliar, it was easy to see who it was. "You're King Mickey's wife, aren't you?" Roxas asked a mouse like person. Both Sakura and Naruto became distracted by this and looked up at the person who looked like a female version of the Kingdom Key-D wielder. "That's right." She giggled. "My name is Queen Minnie. I rule over Disney Town and Disney Castle."

Roxas, Sakura and Naruto gave a little bow to her and then took a step back, staring at all of the faces, who were staring at them in return.

Sakura noticed one of the screens held no faces. However she believed she recognised where it was that the screen was showing.

"Nobody's around at Beast's Castle?" She asked, although not expecting a real answer from anyone.

"Yeah." Leon said, staring at the empty screen. "We haven't heard from Beast or Belle in awhile. We're starting to get worried. I was hoping you could go there next."

"But my world is in more dire need of them. Shan-Yu is moments away from burning down another village, as we speak!" Everyone turned their attention to a Chinese man, with hard cold eyes. He had his hair tied back. He looked all business.

"That's Li Shang." Yuffie said, with distaste. "He's the captain of the Chinese Imperial Army of the Land of Dragons." Then she whispered to Sakura. "He's a sexist jerk."

Sakura's eyebrows burrowed. Roxas, being the most professional and best at this sort of thing took action. "Alright captain. We'll all be there as soon as we can. Beast and Belle might not need our help so much, as they're too busy with their personal lives to worry about the darkness." He said, remembering fondly the relationship the Beast had with the Princess of Heart.

Li Shang frowned at Roxas' statement. "How ignorant of them. Letting their petty social lives get in the middle of a war." None of the Key Wielders liked that. They all knew they would rather spend as much time with their loved ones, as they could.

"But anyway, I don't need all three of you. That girl can go check on this… Beast?"

Sakura's eyes widened. Yuffie gave her a look that said 'I told you so.' The captain looked, as if he was wondering if Sakura was serious or not. When he decided she was, he continued. "Women aren't allowed in my army. However, if you really are set out on coming with your friends, I understand you're a gifted sorceress. You could address the men's wounds and help with their chores." Sakura's mouth opened in an 'o' shape. She closed it shut, beginning to grit her teeth before smiling at the captain. "No, it doesn't matter. I'll send someone else in my place." She promised. Everyone who knew Sakura, knew that there was no way she wasn't coming. She must have had something up her sleeve.

Nothing much more was said after that, Roxas tired to get an order of where to go and when, although the timetable was extremely variable and he doubt it was going to stay as it was. Plus, it wasn't like they had all of the worlds as apart of this society.

Most of the world representatives had gone now. Naruto was speaking, quite excitedly with Jiraiya.

"So, as I understand it, your Key is the only one not to change, since you started your journey?"

"That's right. I'm not that annoyed by it like, but I suppose a change would be good."

"Yeah well. I think I might be able to help with that. I sent over something that should be able to change your Key Kunai."

Interested Naruto looked at Leon, who then sighed and had to go digging for the parcel that Jiraiya had managed to get across the worlds, with great difficulty. It was a scroll.

"Yep. That's the one." Jiraiya said. "Wrap that around your Key's shaft." He instructed, to which Naruto, obediently, obliged.

Suddenly a yellow light enveloped the Key, changing it's shape. Unlike the regular KeyKunai, this new type wasn't just a singular blade. It was slightly leaner and sharper. It also had two smaller blades sprouting out.

"The scroll allows the KeyKunai to change, because it was created with a person's light and chakra. I gave you the same one your father used."

Naruto allowed the information that his father was a Key Wielder to wash over him. He would consider that later.

"This new key is designed for speed attacks. It also has a special ability. Try touching the floor in here and then go outside and do the same." Naruto left the room, after touching the floor, leaving a small seal. He closed the door behind him and everybody heard him yell. First outside and then inside, not even half a second later.

"The flying thunder god technique. You could even use it on people, if you so wished. It allows you to travel distance, in very short amount of time, but you need to have already been there to use it, which is a bit inconvenient. Also you should know, the bigger the distance, the more chakra it takes up. Jumping through worlds, would probably drain you completely." Jiraiya then said his goodbye and his screen went black.

Naruto showed off his new Key with joy and pride.

"You've been falling into the darkness Cloud." Roxas commented. The two had both gone outside, the hustle and bustle of Merlin's house being too much for them.

Cloud looked at Roxas and began to chuckle. "I see your sensory abilities have only gotten better." He said, dryly.

"Mind if I ask why?" Roxas said, wanting to know what would make Cloud do such a thing, as to take to using his own dark powers.

Cloud gave no answer, telling Roxas he didn't want to talk about it, not like he was going to take no for an answer.

"It's him again, isn't it? That guy that Hades said he would help you find." Cloud cringed at the mention of the time when he had almost given into the darkness and was working for Hades. "Sorry."

"It's not your fault. I was an idiot back then…Yes. It's him. I think I finally know what he is and I've been seeing him a lot lately. I've been fighting him as a result."

"What is he? Who is he?"

"He's a developed Nobody. His name is Sephiroth."

"A developed Nobody? He wears a black cloak right?"

"Recently he has yeah. How did you know?" Cloud asked, now sincerely curious.

"That cloak marks him to be apart of Organization XIII. The rulers of the Nobodies and the reason that they're now attacking." Cloud nodded, as if he was expecting as much. "Cloud. We're after them too." Roxas said, to which Cloud seemed indifferent.

"If you see him. You leave him. That guy's my fight and mine alone. I can't have you kids fighting my battles for me again."

Roxas sighed, not knowing if there was any way to change Cloud's mind. "If he leaves us alone, then I'll tell the others to make sure they don't go after him. But Cloud, if that guys attacks us, then I'm not going to hold back for your sake."

Cloud hesitated, but he nodded after a few seconds, as if this was logic he could understand and respect.

Naruto, Sakura and Leon walked out of the Merlin's house. "Follow me to the bailey, Roxas. There's something you all need to see." He said, the four began walking, being joined by Cloud at one point.

Meanwhile, inside of Maleficent's castle, now eroded and decayed through time, a bumbling cat like creature named Pete was exploring the ruined remains looking for his master. "Maleficent…" He called, quietly looking around. He was at the top of the castle now. There was no where else to look.

Pete looked around but didn't see any sign of the evil sorceress. "Maybe they really did destroy her…" Pete whispered, quietly to himself, not sure exactly what to feel. Maleficent wasn't exactly a nice master, but she was powerful and Pete needed power. "Oh now what's going to happen to my plan!" He shouted, banging on the castle wall, giving up his search.

Just then however, a crow, as black as night, swooped into the room. It landed on the middle of the table and opened his mouth wide, letting out a dreadful noise.

Pete took a double take. The crow belonged to Maleficent, it was hardly ever seen without her. Within the crow's talons was another something belonging to Maleficent. Her cloak.

"I'm guessing you saw this when you came down." Leon said, indicating to the ruins of Maleficent's castle, far away from the rest of Hallow Bastion town. It was clearly visible from the bailey. "You see, we want to make Hallow Bastion to what it used to be like. Maybe even something better. That's the goal of the Hallow Bastion Restoration Committee. But we can't handle everything. The Nobodies and the strongest heartless, which still reside in that castle are too much for us."

The Key Wielders nodded. "We can handle the heartless and Organization XIII!" Naruto boasted.

"Oh really?" A deep and somewhat menacing voice echoed throughout the bailey. It was coming from outside though. Back to the direction of Merlin's house.

"Well we'll just see about that!" A slightly higher voice cried out, accepting Naruto's challenge.

Nobodies appeared outside the bailey and inside. Cloud took up his blade, as did Leon. "Get the castle gates closed. We can't let the Nobodies get out. They could hurt people. You deal with the ones already out." Cloud commanded, himself and Roxas staying inside the bailey, while the other three had the task of tracking down the Nobodies that had got out.

The Nobodies, a large group of them were gathered around Merlin's house. Some looked like they were about to get into the heart of town and wreck havoc. "Flying thunder God technique!" Naruto said, jumping into action throwing his new KeyKunai at the enemies, striking one and appearing right beside them. "Rasengan!" He cried, coming out of the teleportation technique. Blowing the Dusks back, with a blue ball full of chakra.

Leon was having no difficulty fending off the Dusks, with his personal weapon. The Gunblade.

Sakura was soon surrounded by Dusks, who were walking around her in the creepy way they did, that made it look like they didn't have bones. "Fiery! Windy!" She called out, summoning out two of her favourite Star Cards. The two floated around, encircling the enemies. The two started to mix and the area around Sakura caught fire, not burning anything or anyone else than the Dusks.

"Omnislash!" Cloud cried, throwing himself into the Dusks that were trying to wreck the Castle Gates. His speed was amazing, probably even faster than Naruto. His Buster Blade sliced through the enemies, like they weren't even there.

"Oath of Oblivion!" Roxas shouted out, telling Cloud to move out of his way, as Roxas began slashing the air, creating a black and white star as he did so. Roxas finished the attack, by tracing a circle around the star. It was a mix between light and darkness, not something Roxas could easily do, but he was trying to test himself. The attack collided with the remaining Nobodies, creating a large explosion. There was no survivors.

"Your Keys are truly marvellous weapons. But how is it, that they never seem to choose good enough wielders." The first voice from before boomed, from somewhere unknown. Laughter followed his comment, showing that there was more than one.

"Stop hiding you cowards!" Naruto said, being bold enough to call them names, despite knowing the power they possessed.

From one of the highest points in Hallow Bastion, the point where the Key Wielders had arrived themselves it seemed, corridors of darkness opened up revealing several cloaked figures. One even seemed to be standing on all fours.

"It's definitely them." Naruto said, smirking. "Now we can settle this here and now!"

"And here I thought we could be friends." The leader of Organization XIII said, obviously mocking them, to which Naruto growled. Literally growling a fox's growl. More laughter followed.

The Organization members disappeared. Roxas could follow their movements to a point and could see that most of them were leaving the scene. Apparently Cloud didn't agree with that. "Sephiroth!" He shouted, jumping into the sky, his legs covered in an eerie power, which everybody there could recognise as darkness, not completely under the user's control.

"He'll end up like Sasuke doing something like that." Naruto said, spitting at the ground.

"Who's Sephiroth anyway?" Sakura asked. Roxas pretended not to know, not wanting to betray Cloud's trust, he merely shrugged to Sakura's question.

Suddenly Roxas turned his head, sharply, sensing the presence of one of the Organization members. Sure enough, a cloaked figure appeared via a corridor of darkness.

"Outta of our way!" Naruto shouted, bearing his sharp teeth. Leon had been able to go on ahead and reign Cloud in, but this Organization member obviously wasn't going to let them have their way.

"Now, now. Do you really think that's polite? You'll never get anywhere acting like that. How don't we introduce ourselves. My name's Xigbar. Number Two in Organization XIII. I wield Arrowguns and can control Space. So basically, one wrong move and I can swoop in and take you out." He said it, almost casually, but somehow put enough menace behind them to make even Naruto quiet.

"Now that's more like it. Although you could do to improve your faces. What did I drown your goldfish or something. Especially you." He pointed at Roxas and started to laugh. "He used to give me that exact same look. Sure it helps that you look exactly alike."

Roxas allowed himself to be confused by Xigbar's statement. Who was he? And how did this guy and Roxas look alike?

"Stop trying to confuse him. Looks like you're all talk for number two." Naruto said, obviously extremely pissed at the Organization for laughing at him.

Xigbar opened up his arms. "Am I really trying to confuse him? And I wouldn't go making assumptions about me. You see, I ain't just any old dude. Here, let me show you." Fast as lightning, Xigbar unveiled two odd looking weapons. These must have been Xigbar's Arrowguns. They fired multiple crystal like ammo, which nobody wanted to take a chance with.

"Shield!" Sakura cried, just as fast as Xigbar, defending all three of the Key Wielders.

Xigbar stood back. "Well, it looks like you guys do have a few moves. Well whatever. You guys be good now!" He called, giving them a wave, like they were old friends and disappearing into the darkness.

"Roxas." Cloud greeted the spiky blond haired boy, as the two both returned to Merlin's house. Cloud took him away from the others for a moment. "I've been thinking. Sephiroth…Organization XIII are as much as my battle, as they are your's. But I do want to be the one who deliverers that final blow to Sephiroth. I still can't…no I won't tell you much, because I this is my heart's battle. I think everyone has one. Don't you?" Roxas thought for a moment and nodded, so Cloud continued.

"You can use summons right. Well, here." He dug into his pocket and threw Roxas a sliver charm, which he caught with ease. It was identical to the wolf badge that Cloud had on him. "You can use that to summon me whenever you see Sephiroth. I suppose you could also use it, if you need me to get you out of your messes too." The two blondes smirked and returned to Merlin's house wordlessly.

"Membership cards?" Naruto asked, receiving one of his very own. It said he was officially apart of not only the Key Wielders Support Society, but also the Hallow Bastion Restoration Committee as well. Each of the three Key Wielders got one. Their names were on the back.

"Oh this is so cool. Thanks." Naruto said, admiring it, before it began to glow and being surrounded in light.

"A gate?" Naruto cried, excitedly.

"The most important thing in this world." Sakura murmured. "Since it couldn't be the committee itself, it must have chosen to become the membership card."

Naruto entered the world of clouds at a sunset, the hidden leaf's symbol appeared at his feet. A keyhole erupted from the card, at the same moment that a beam of light erupted from the sharp tip of Naruto's KeyKunai.

The card floated into his hand, once Naruto was finished.

"So what now? There's still a lot to do here." Naruto asked. Leon shook his head.

"Actually there really isn't. We can't do too much at the moment, however there are places that are in need of you right now. You should go to them."

The rest of the Hallow Bastion crew nodded and waved, smiling maybe a bit sadly…

_A/N- These chapters are getting FREAKISHLY long. I believe I already mentioned this, but I'm going to do this again. For the majority of the worlds, there are no second visits. I will be joining the two parts up into one story, doing what the manga did to a certain extent. This is going to make them very, very long and I may not be able to update as fast as I would like. I do apologise for this. _

_Next Time- Showdown in the Land of Dragons! _


	10. Chapter 10

Showdown in the Land of Dragons!

_A/N- As I thought, these next chapters are going to take me a long time to do, but I hope you can all continue to put up with me. _

"So we're heading to the Land of Dragons, right Naruto?"

The blond ninja nodded, absentmindedly. He seemed to be absorbed in his own thoughts. It wasn't surprising, he had of course been asleep for over two years. He was probably disoriented.

"Uh…yeah. That's the world that I was thinking about when I opened the gate. Is that Shang guy expecting us?" He asked Roxas in return who was acting as their representative and talked to the other world representatives.

"Yeah, we have to join his Imperial Army or whatever. You better be on your toes, Naruto. It's probably gonna be pretty strict."

Naruto let out an annoyed sigh and gave Roxas a look that said _'Yeah I know.' _

"Speaking of which…" Naruto turned around to face Sakura, a playful smirk on his face, which made her edge away from him. "You still haven't explained this plan of your's. This one about sending someone in your place in the army. How's that going to work?" The Imperial Army had a rule about not accepting girls, so Sakura wasn't allowed to join with Roxas and Naruto. Of course that wasn't going to stop her.

Sakura played with her hair casually. She didn't answer for a while, until she caught both of the boys looking at her, expectedly. She sighed. "I was planning on just using the illusion card to make everyone see me as a boy. I thought if I used it as a drive form it would make the illusion even more powerful and believable." She shrugged.

The boys shared a look of doubt neither looking happy with Sakura's decision. Sakura didn't like that. "Oh have a little faith." Sakura told them, frowning. "I know that employing the drive forms are supposed to be difficult, but I think I can do it if I concentrate and work at it hard enough."

Roxas bit his lip and tried to avoid eye contact with Sakura. "But, you see, that isn't our problem Sakura. The illusion card can make a great illusion and everyone will think you're a boy, but what if you're told to do something only a boy could do. You know, physically."

Sakura's eyebrows raised, her nostrils flared and her glare made Naruto and Roxas flinch. "Need I remind you that 'Fight' and 'Power' are both female? And then I'm sure I'll be fine. I may not be as strong as you guys are, but I can fight. I know how to use a sword and my magic should allow me to do well enough that I don't come under suspicion."

The boys still didn't look convinced. "I swear!" Sakura yelled, throwing her hands up into the air to emphasize her annoyance. "You guys are sexist pigs. I'm sure Xion and Hinata will love to hear that."

"I'm pretty sure Li would be the same. He wouldn't want you to hurt yourself or anything." Roxas commented, his hands also up, but his to show his surrender and that he didn't want trouble.

"Or be in danger. If Shang catches you, he has the legal ability to order your death."

Sakura sobered up after that. She was cursing herself for not doing the research that the boys had obviously done. Still, she had to be confident enough to just do this, for her pride more than anything. Besides she was trying to help this world.

"You better call on the Illusion card. We're here." Chip told Sakura after a few more minutes. Sakura nodded, gazing out at the world from above. She drew the card from the deck and summoned out her wand. "I call on the power of my star. Ancient forces near and far. Star card, I call on all your might, join with me and prepare to fight!" There was a small flash of light and Sakura was for a moment, curled up in a ball, with the Illusion card circling her.

When the process was finished, Sakura's appearance was a multicoloured silhouette of her normal form, much like Illusion's appearance.

She didn't do anything for a moment and then suddenly her appearance changed. She sprouted shortish black hair, a pale complexion and glasses which went over a pair of raven black eyes. She…he smiled, which looked somewhat creepy. Sakura looked down at her clothing, a special sort of cloak, which made her look like some crazy sorcerer.

"…Eli…" Sakura whispered, looking at herself in a mirror in her room. She returned to the others, who looked at the male form that Sakura had decided to take.

"We thought for sure you were going to choose to look like Li." Naruto chuckled, something told Sakura that the boys had been joking about exactly how Sakura would treat looking like her love.

Sakura shrugged in response. "I have no idea why I chose this form, but I did…It feels familiar. I don't know why." She said, her mind wandering.

"Well whatever. Let's just get down there." Roxas said, opening the gummie ship door.

Down on the Land of Dragon world, a young man dressed in a black and green armour and their black hair tied up in a short bun. A small red Chinese dragon rested on the man's shoulders. They were peering through some trees to look at what seemed to be the ruins of a village. Much of it was still on fire. In the middle of it all was a man dressed in an odd assortment of clothing, with a bird of his shoulder. He was laughing mirthlessly.

The two looked away from the sight, neither wanted the man to see them. "You saw that, right? That's Shan-Yu. The leader of the Hun army. And now he's got these crazy dark things followed his orders too. Come on! I can see it now. Fa Mulan whoops public enemy number one. You'll be famous girl!"

"Mushu, I don't know about this. All I really want is to do is take my father's place and preserve my family's honour. Not getting discovered is a task in itself, but defeating Shan-Yu is a different one entirely." The man had quite a feminine voice.

"Aw come on girl! You're scared, admit it!"

"Well…aren't you?" Mulan answered, looking uncomfortable as the dragon shook his tiny head in disbelief at the lack of confidence the girl had.

The Key Wielders landed in a thicket of bamboo. They were supposed to meet Captain Shang at a nearby camp, where he was training his solders and recruiting some new ones. It was a small walk from where they were now.

The three started walking in the direction that they thought that camp was in, the reason that they didn't land at the camp was that the boys both decided that Sakura needed a bit of time to try walking and acting like a boy. It was soon obvious that the time was well needed.

As the three were walking, they bumped into what seemed to be a solder. He seemed bashful, but he had a small dragon with him that more than made up for his shyness. "Hey there. Are you joining the Imperial Army too?" Naruto asked him, as they stopped to talk.

The boy hesitated. "That's right." He mumbled.

"Yeah that's right! My…boy here's gonna be number one! Gonna teach that Shang guy a thing or two."

"Mushu. Please." The boy begged. Sakura frowned. _'There's something not right here.' _She thought to herself.

"Yeah we'll see. Captain Li asked us to join the army and help out against the heartless. You know the black guys following this Shan-Yu guy around. My name's Naruto. And these are my friends Roxas and…" He hesitated, looking at Sakura unsure of what to do.

"Eli." Sakura answered, without thinking. It was the name she thought of when she first took the form and it just seemed…right.

The boy nodded. "I am…Ping! Son of Fa Zu." He said, puffing out his chest and deepening his voice.

Sakura's frown deepened. "So, uh…who's the little guy?" She asked, indicating Mushu who was glaring at her, not appreciating being called something so demeaning.

"His name is Mushu. He's one of my family's guardians." Ping told them all. Nobody said anything for awhile and then Ping's eyes lit up, as if he had just had a thought. "Could I join you guys. It would be easier to fit in the Imperial Army if I'm with guys like you."

"What do you mean 'fit in'?" Roxas asked, eyeing the two characters suspiciously, probably also checking their hearts for darkness.

"Uh…well. You know. I'm just…shy. I thought people might accept me more if I was with you three, who came here at Captain Li's personal request."

Naruto didn't look impressed. "You know, you should really do that…" But he was cut off by Sakura.

"Sure, we'd love to have you along with us. But that would probably mean some rigorous training. You'd be pushed harder than the other solders. Would you be okay with that?" Naruto glared at her and Roxas raised his eyebrows in her direction. He wanted to see where she was going with this.

Ping nodded, vigorously. "That's okay. I can fight and I'm not that weak. I can handle myself at the very least."

Sakura nodded and turned to her male companions. "There you go see. Another girl who can do anything a guy can do and willing to do more!" She said, victoriously.

Naruto's and Roxas' jaws dropped open and they turned to Ping. "You're a…girl?"

Ping smiled a bit at their reaction. "You didn't notice?" She asked, her voice much lighter now, obviously belonging to a girl. They shook their heads in response.

She smiled a bit longer and then turned to Sakura and her smile faded a bit. "But you saw through me almost straight away." She said, sadly. "And I was so sure this was going to work."

Sakura giggled and shook her head. "It's okay. Another girl might be able to recognise you, but a boy wouldn't be any the wiser."

"Another girl?" Sakura's appearance faltered a bit, before returning to her original appearance. She smiled at Ping.

"My real name is Sakura Avalon. I'm here because I want to help my friends and this world, but Shang's rules made me resort to these measures, as I'm sure you already know."

Ping nodded again. "My real name is Mulan. I'm here to preserve my family's honour, since my father can no longer participate in the war and I was unable to find a husband." She said, sadly.

Sakura shook her head, in disbelief. "What? Is this whole world sexist. We need to do something here. God!"

The camp site wasn't too far away after that. The four found it within minutes, tents were set up everywhere, with a large one up front. That must have been Captain Li's tent.

A loud noise, like a horn of some kind, went off just as the four entered the camp. At first they thought it might have been to signal their arrival, but it soon became obvious that Shang didn't consider them that important.

The horn was instead signalling it was time for lunch. The solders were made to line up in what the Key Wielders thought was Shang's tent, but was in fact a place where medicine and food was stored. Sakura didn't see any other kind of large tent, all the others were the same.

"Well at least he seems to believe in equal rights for Men." She said, with only a tad bit of distaste.

"Come on. We might as well line up too. Best way to talk to Shang, since he's probably the one handing it out." Roxas said, shrugging.

The four lined up, like all the other men. "Outta my way!" An unattractive, podgy man dressed in a red armour named Yao, came and pushed Naruto out of his place in line.

Two other men, one in yellow (Ling) and another in blue (Chien Po) took Yao's lead and pushed their way into the line too. "Oi! What do you think you're doing?" Naruto fumed.

The solders didn't even bat an eyelid, as he yelled. Naruto couldn't let it go, of course. "Damn it! Don't ignore me!" This time Yao did react, he turned and threw a punch at the ninja.

Naruto's reflexes were good, but he wasn't expecting it. Also at Yao's height, it went straight to his stomach. He groaned for a moment, his eyes flashing with anger.

Roxas, usually the level headed one, was outraged by Yao's unneeded violent outburst. "Hey! What do you think you're doing?"

The little man turned to him. "Do you want some too?" He asked, his lips positioned to make it look like he was snarling. Neither Roxas nor Naruto moved an inch. They both looked quite unimpressed actually.

"Try it." Naruto said, confident. Yao growled and Naruto growled back. It wasn't long before they were matching each other hit for hit, rolling on the floor.

Roxas shook his head and sighed, but tried to help him out. Sakura, along with the solders that arrived with Yao got involved as well. Mulan was taken aback and was especially surprised by Sakura's actions.

"Please!" Mulan begged. Everyone stopped, immediately, and looked at Mulan with a varying looks. The solders looked a mixture of shock and disgust.

"Please?" Yao repeated, glaring at Mulan who trembled under him.

"Uh…I mean. Knock it off!" Mulan said, deepening her voice and puffing out her chest again. The solders rolled their eyes and started making fun of her, as they regained themselves and returned to their place in line.

Shang walked down the line, inspecting what the cause of the commotion was. He glared at the solders in red, yellow and blue, before turning his eyes on his new recruits.

"So you're the famous Key Wielders. In the flesh. I would expect, you who apparently saved the universe from the Heartless would have a little more restraint from you." His eyes passed and locked on to Mulan and Sakura.

"And who are these two?" He addressed Roxas and Naruto, instead of asking Sakura and/or Mulan to introduce themselves.

"My name is Eli. Sakura asked me to come in her place." Sakura said, defiantly.

Shang raised an eyebrow. "I wasn't aware of anymore Key Wielders."

"I'm not well known. I like to stick to the shadows. I'm sure if you ask the right people, someone can tell you who I am." Sakura answered, impressing those around her, by lying quickly and fluently.

"And you?" Whether he believed Sakura or not remained to be seen. He not turned his attention to Mulan.

"My name is Ping. I asked the Key Wielders, personally, if I may be of help to them. I am from the Fa family. It's a honour Captain." She bowed, and Shang seemed stuck between the fact that he knew nothing about the 'man' that was before him and the fact that he was better tempered and mannered that the group he was supposed to have invited here, personally.

"I see…" Shang left, thoughtfully. But he was faced with heartless, just as he was leaving. The solders started to panic, knowing that their normal attacks usually didn't affect these creatures. "You! Quickly. Do your job. This will test to see if you're worthy of serving the Imperial Army!" He shouted, while ordering all other men to get back and observe.

Sakura didn't look happy being belittled by Shang, but realised she might as well do her job great and earn his respect, rather than pout about it.

"Shield! Dark! Light!" Sakura cried, the two male Key Wielders looked at each other and told 'Ping' to get back. "Yin Yang Vortex!" She cried, the shield card, taking a round shield like form, lay flat out of her open palm. A Yin Yang decoration on its front. The symbol began to move and it opened, suddenly the heartless were being sucked into the shield. Into, what Sakura could only imagine as another dimension or something similar.

Afterwards, Sakura fell to her knees, exhausted. The attack was probably Sakura's most powerful, and as such it drained her to a dangerous point. Mulan rushed to her side, to help her up. "Well done." She whispered in the other girl's ear. Sakura nodded and thanked her.

"Eli, is it?" Shang said, after Sakura was back on her feet. She nodded. The captain smirked. "Those skills out there were quite incredible. Are the rest of you that strong?"

Sakura shook her head. "Me and Sakura are on the same level, but Roxas and Naruto are much stronger." She told him. Shang looked impressed. He nodded and went on his face.

He noticed Mulan, entering Sakura's tent, just as he was leaving. "But you still need to prove yourself. I haven't seen any talent from you yet." He told her. Mulan nodded, earnestly.

"I'll do my best sir." 'He' told Shang, who nodded and wore a facial expression that told 'Ping' that, that was expected of him anyway. He wanted to see more.

"I've a mission for you four." Shang told the Key Wielders some few days later, as it was continued to show that the four worked well together and Mulan was slowly earning some of the Captain's respect.

"We're moving up the mountain soon. There's a village up there that has requested our assistance and protection. However, the mountain path is blocked by boulders and is crawling with heartless. As you can probably guess, I need you four to go up first and scout the area, eliminating anything that might be problematic for the rest of the army on your way."

The four nodded and hurried to get packed and move out.

Once the four were safely at the mountain path's entrance, the four came to a halt. There was a large amount of boulders in their way for one thing, but Sakura had asked the others to wait, while she broke her connection with the 'Illusion card'.

She sighed, heavily. She had made a rough estimate of how much power she used up, having Illusion fuse with her, constantly. The answer was 'A lot.' So, she had to break off the connection whenever possible, otherwise she could do real damage to herself.

"You take it easy." Naruto told her, he made a hand signs, summoning shadow clones. Two of which went over to Sakura to help her walk. She was proud, but also smart enough to accept help when she needed it and surrendered herself to the two clones, who carried her.

Roxas watched her solemnly, then turned his attention to Mulan. "We're going to be taking on all the heartless that come around, while Naruto focuses on the boulders okay?"

Mulan nodded, curtly and took out her father's sword, looking ready for battle.

"Byakugan! Rasengan!" Using his gift from Hinata to spot weak points in the boulder formations and taking them out with the Rasengan proved to be a good strategy and Naruto moved quickly.

Nightwalkers and Assault Riders were two breeds of heartless, the gang hadn't encountered before coming to the Land of Dragons. Both kinds were formidable foes, which Mulan had trouble subduing. "Stop!" Roxas cried, making his enemies freeze in place, so he could defeat them without any trouble.

The group made it to the village without trouble soon after that. Sakura had to return to her Eli guise, as Naruto signalled for the rest of the troop to make its way up the mountain.

The first to arrive was Yao, Ling and Chien Po who, humbly, admitted their wrongs and complemented the group, especially 'Eli' and 'Ping' choosing to use the term. "Finest men among all men." Which made Roxas and Naruto chuckle and they had to leave, before they burst into laughter.

The Captain was the next one up. He nodded to the two out of the group of four remaining. "Good work. You better do us proud now." His eyes hesitated on Mulan. "And Ping…well done. You seem to be keeping up with the others just fine." He walked off. Sakura congratulated her on getting Shang's approval, who did likewise before they settled in the village.

"I'm telling you guys. There's this shady looking guy hiding out in a cave not too far from here. I know it's Shan-Yu." Mushu told the group. He had gone off to explore, almost as soon as they had arrived in the village.

"If it's Shan-Yu, then we should tell Shang and get the troops to surround him." Roxas suggested, a part of him loved having so many people to coordinate into a fight.

"He's right." Mulan said, nodding.

"Not so fast Mu- eh…Ping." He said, as some solders were passing by at the time. He lowered his voice and continued. "Mulan, girl, you're here to bring honour to your family. The best way to do that is to fry up that Shan-Yu guy good. I know with all four you on him together you can do it."

Mulan hesitated, realising that Mushu was right. The others exchanged looks. Roxas sighed, as everyone eventually turned their gazes on him. He held up his hands in surrender. "Alright. We'll go check it out. I guess this means we won't be putting any of the other solders in harm's way…" He trailed off. The others smiled, victoriously and the group headed off to the cave that Mushu had discovered.

The cave was close to the village, closer than any of the group would have liked. Way too close. They explored with Mulan and Sakura leading and the boys bringing up the rear.

They eventually found the end of the cave. A round room, lit by candles. It did look like someone had been using it as temporary living conditions. But there was no one there at the time.

"Dead end." Roxas said. "He's not here. We might as well go back and inform the Captain about it though."

Naruto nodded, not seeing anything of interest in the cave and turning around to leave. The girls remained in the room for a moment longer, before deciding to leave as well.

Of course, the room filled with heartless at that exact point. A barrier went up between the boys and the girls separating them. It was made of darkness, and Roxas probably could have destroyed it in moments, if he wanted, but sounds of screams and a hair raising laugh distracted him.

"Go on! We can take care of ourselves here!" Sakura said, breaking the connection between her and 'Illusion'.

The boys nodded and ran towards the village. That left Sakura and Mulan in a room full of heartless. "Let's go." Sakura told Mulan, who nodded getting to work on the Shadow heartless that clumped together in groups.

"Release the Light!" Sakura said, drawing five different talismans from her pocket. "Fire! Water! Earth! Wind! Lightning!" All around her streams of energy zoomed around, taking out heartless whenever they could. "Sword."

The group of heartless wasn't strong, but there was a lot of them and so it took the two girls awhile to defeat them all. "Dark card!" Sakura cried, summoning out the black mistress who handled the barrier and freed them from the cave. The two girls rushed out, Sakura making sure her disguise was back on before leaving.

The two girls gasped at the state of the village, as they arrived. It had almost been burnt down to the ground. Shang was lying against the wall of the village, clutching a wound. Roxas was covering any remaining flames and also healing anyone who had been injured. Naruto was defeating the last of the heartless.

The two regrouped with the four. "It was a trap." Roxas said, bitterly. "Shan-Yu was hiding out. He tried to lure us and trap us in the cave. Too bad for him, me and Naruto got out when we did."

"Where is Shan-Yu now?" Mulan asked. Shang was the one who answered.

"He went towards the summit!" Shang breathed, shakily. He was still clutching his wound and was barely able to keep himself up.

Mulan turned on Roxas. "Why didn't you heal him too?"

"He wouldn't let me!" Roxas replied, defensively.

"It's just a scratch." Shang said, trying to smile, but failing miserably.

"We'll go and stop him. Once and for all!" Mulan said, determinedly. Seeing the captain like this must have sparked her passion.

Mushu hung his tiny head in shame. "It's all my fault. I was stupid enough to fall for that rat Shan-Yu's tricks…"

"Stop that!" Naruto said, patting him gently on his scaly back. "Anyone would have done the same. You were just trying to do what you thought was best for your friend. Trust me, that's how every good guy gets tricked."

Mushu nodded, still sad but at the same time his eyes had the same determination that Mulan's were showing off. "Let's go!"

The gang headed towards the summit of the mountain, it wasn't a long journey from the village, but it was difficult to climb up, especially with the slippery snow on the ground.

With Mulan leading the group, Roxas found himself bringing up the rear. They were almost to the top, when Roxas stopped. He could feel something. No that wasn't right. The truth was he couldn't sense anything.

Roxas turned to see a man in an organization cloak. He wasn't giving off any kind of presence. Actually, it was like he was hiding his presence somehow. "Who-"

Before Roxas could finish his sentence, the man rushed past him and the others, with a great speed. "Wait!" Roxas cried, chasing after him.

None of the others noticed the man, until he rushed past them and by then it was too late to stop him.

"Organization XIII?" Naruto asked Roxas, who had gotten the best look.

Roxas hesitated before answering. "I don't know. Maybe. I couldn't sense his presence. But he was wearing their cloak…"

Mulan looked troubled by the man. "He's one of the bad guys?" She asked, to which the others nodded in response. "That's what I thought. There have been rumours for awhile now about a spy dressed in black lurking in the mountains."

The gang took in the information. "Come on. We need to get going!" Naruto cried, bursting with energy.

The gang reached the foot of the mountain within moments after they encountered the man in the cloak. Shan-Yu stood at the summit's top, looking tall and mighty, with his falcon on his shoulder. He began to laugh and it soon became obvious that Shan-Yu had the upper hand here. He had a heartless army of easily a thousand. Naruto cursed.

He, along with Mulan and Sakura, went right into the battle taking out the heartless that soon surrounded them.

Roxas was going to charge in too, but something stopped him. For a second time, he turned around to see the cloaked man looking at him. "Who are you? Part of Organization XIII or…" The man didn't answer, instead he pointed behind Roxas. The blond turned and swung with the X-Blade taking out a few of the heartless that were about to attack him. The cloaked man seemed to be laughing. He took out a blade. It sparked a memory in Roxas' mind. But the blade looked also slightly different. It reminded Roxas of Soul Eater. It reminded him of Sasuke.

The two's blades clashed together and then the guys separated to attack the heartless around him. "Oblivion Arrow!" Roxas cried, sending a dark powered attacked at his opponent.

The man in the cloak didn't seem phased. He raised his hand and a shield went up. It was made of darkness. Then he fired a multiple of dark orbs. "Reflect." Roxas said, sending the orbs at the surrounding heartless.

The man came at Roxas, quickly, his sword infused with both darkness and light, he began slashing wildly. If Roxas had any doubts they were gone now. "Oath of Oblivion!" The attack sent the man flying. He landed at the foot of the summit, but part of his body was hanging off the ledge.

Roxas rushed to the man, but before he got there the man let go of the edge. Roxas eyes followed the man down to point where he disappeared through a corridor of darkness. Roxas chuckled. "Sasuke. What am I going to do with you…"

The others were about done with the rest of the heartless, but there was still quite a few heartless still around and of course Shan-Yu was still around. He seemed to be taking a back seat to the battle. That being said, he seemed he was now happy to take the battle into his own hands. He charged down the summit, his jagged sword raised above his head.

Yao, Ling and Chien Po arrived at that point, they were carrying some kind of giant firework of some kind. The three seemed content to aiming it right at Shan-Yu to take him out.

Mulan look worried, she seemed like she was about to say something, but instead shoved Yao aside and took the firework for herself. Very boyish.

Mulan instead aimed the firework at the mountain side above the summit. She fumbled around for something to light the firework. Finally her eyes locked on her guardian and despite his protests she pulled his tail, making sparks erupt out of his mouth.

The firework took off to the mountain side, black some following it, until a small explosion took place on the mountain side, causing a huge avalanche.

"Yes!" Mulan cheered. She looked around to smile at her companions, but her smile faded when she saw that the still injured Captain Li was limping towards them. Her eyes switched to the avalanche and then to the Captain. He was going to be caught in it.

Shan-Yu howled, as the huge amount of snow rolled over and crushed him. Mulan ran and grabbed Shang's hand, pulling him to safety. "Run for it!" Yao cried and everyone started running away too.

Everyone was breathing heavily as they finally reached a point where they were no longer in danger. Especially Mulan, who had to practically drag her injured captain. "Thanks Ping." Shang breathed, gratefully.

"It…it was nothing." Mulan said, helping the Captain up and then falling to her knees. She moaned in pain, clutching her stomach, in agony.

"You're injured." Shang realised. "Lie down. I've got a first aid kit with me, I can deal with your wounds."

"No! Please. I'm fine!"

"Don't be silly. Here, take off your armour…"

"Ping! Captain!" Sakura said, coming towards them.

Shang's eyes were ablaze with fury. His lips were quivering with anger. The three had seen a lot of things in their time, but they almost cowered under his glare. "You knew! You all knew, didn't you? That Ping was actually a girl named Mulan."

The boys didn't meet his eyes, but Sakura did. "Yes, but so what. She saved your life and defeated Shan-Yu. She saved this world, for crying out loud. Male or female, it shouldn't matter." She broke her connection with the 'Illusion card', revealing her true self.

Shang looked taken aback. "I can't believe this. All of you lied to me." He turned his back on the group. "The punishment for lying and disgracing the Imperial Army…is death." He let that sink in, Roxas was ready to get everyone out of here in a moment's notice.

"Get out of my sight." He told them. "You're all dismissed. I thank you for saving this world. This makes my debt repaid."

Roxas opened a corridor, which allowed Mulan to return home. "Thank you. All of you. Especially you Sakura. Thanks for sticking up for me."

Sakura shook her head. "It was nothing really." Mulan smiled. Then she faced the corridor.

Mushu huffed, sadly. "Your daddy's going to be steamed." He told her, she nodded, in equal sadness.

Then the ground began to rumble. A hawk screeched overhead. And a loud, ferocious roar sounded throughout the whole of the mountain.

A giant heartless rose into the air. It seemed to be that of a dragon. Shan-Yu was on its back, with his sword raised. He then pointed it towards the west and the dragon heartless took off.

"He's heading towards the Imperial City. The emperor! We've got to warn Shang."

The others nodded. "Put your armour in the corridor. I'll create another to get to the city." Mulan did so. She wore her hair down and wore a brown and green martial arts robe.

The gang reached the City before Shan-Yu, or at least so it seemed.

The courtyard was empty and the main gate was locked up tight. The group looked around, but couldn't see any way of getting in, except for a large enough gap for them all to crawl through. The problem was that it was at the top of the Emperor's palace.

Sakura and Naruto could get up there with no problem, but Roxas and Mulan would have trouble getting high enough. "Tinker Bell! I need you!" Clutching one of his summon charms.

A huge ball of light glowed in front of them, once it faded, a little blond haired girl in a little green dress appeared. She looked pissed off. She went right into Roxas' face who tried to calm the little girl down.

"Please Tink. I've been asleep. I'm sorry for not summoning you in so long. But hey, it's not like you've aged a day. You're as beautiful, as the first day I saw you." Tinker Bell blushed and tried to hide her smile. She circled the four, allowing them to take to the sky.

"Come on! Let's go!"

The gang found themselves in a long room, lined with lanterns. A man in a cloak was right in front of a door, with a dragon symbol on it. The four floated down to the floor.

"Not so fast!" Naruto cried, running towards the cloaked man. He flinched and turned around on the spot.

Roxas turned his head, as if he was thinking. "Sasuke…?" The others exchanged looks.

The cloaked man laughed a little. He took his hood down, revealing a weathered face. A long scar ran up his left cheek and he had an eye patch over his right eye. His hair was tied in a long ponytail and was streaked with grey. "Never heard of him. It's me; Xigbar, remember? I'm number two in the Organization that's going to be kicking your ass."

He clicked his fingers and suddenly the room was filled with a group of Nobodies. Sniper Nobodies.

They raised their crossbows and took aim at the gang. "Reflect!"

"Rotation!" The arrows made of a powerful energy bounced off of the two's shielding techniques and hit back at their opponents taking them out.

When the Nobodies were gone, the gang looked around to look for Xigbar, who seemed to have vanished. "He's still around…Guys. I'm going after him." He said, turning around and flying off.

"Roxas! Wait!" Sakura called after him.

Naruto shook his head, in disbelief. "There's no point. He's been taking these Organization guys really seriously. Besides, he's upset. He still has no idea if Naminé and Sasuke are alright."

Sakura sighed and nodded, realising that Naruto was right. "Let's go."

The other three entered the Emperor's throne room. The Emperor himself, an aged man, with a long white beard sat in a comfortable looking chair at the very top of the room. Not much of a throne in retrospect.

The three bowed and went on their knees upon entering. "We apologise for barging in like this." Sakura began.

"But please listen to us. Shan-Yu is alive. He's coming here with a large and powerful dragon like heartless. We believe he's coming after you."

"And why should we believe you this time?" Shang said, viciously.

Mulan looked down at the floor, but she clenched her fists and looked Shang straight in the eye. "I realise that you have no reason to believe us. And I don't expect you to give me another chance. But I'm telling you now to warn you, otherwise all of China will be in danger!"

Shang smiled, as did the Emperor. "I see what you mean, Shang." He said. "This is definitely a very interesting woman."

Mulan blushed, taking the Emperor's words as a compliment. "To be honest, we were already warned about Shan-Yu. A young man in a black cloak came and told us about it."

"What?" Sakura asked, but there was no time for a reply. A loud roar came from outside, making everyone brace themselves and frown solemnly.

"He's here." Naruto said. "I'm going to take on the heartless. You two stay here and protect the Emperor." He ordered, taking off.

The two girls nodded and readied themselves for the worst.

"So Roxas. How do you expect to defeat me by yourself?" Xigbar asked, apparently amused by how Roxas had chased Xigbar alone.

"I don't need to get my friends involved just for taking out someone like you." Roxas replied, icily.

"Oh!" Xigbar said, gesturing with his hands to tell Roxas to stop. "That's cold. You're going to hurt my feelings."

Xigbar waited for a bit. The surprise on his face looked genuine. "What? No 'Oh you don't have feelings' crap. None of that from you?"

Roxas shook his head. "I know that Nobodies can feel too. It doesn't matter if you supposedly don't have hearts or not."

Xigbar's hands moved to where his heart would be. "Aw. That's too cute. You're going to make me cry. But there's just one thing. I think I have to teach you a lesson. You're a million years off, from taking me on your own!"

His hands moved as fast as lightning, taking up his Arrowguns and shooting at Roxas, who was fast too and blocked every attack that came his way.

"You'll need to do better than that Xigbar! Oathkeeper Thrust!" Roxas came in fast, charging with his Keyblade, which was empowered by light energy.

Roxas was attacking the air. He looked around to see Xigbar firing shots from behind him. The attacks hit Roxas right on, causing him to fall to his knees. "Thunder!" He cried, Xigbar tried dodging him again, but the thunder magic was fast and followed Xigbar until he resurfaced.

Roxas jumped to his feet. "Stop!" He cried, using his magic to freeze Xigbar and then swinging the X-Blade, which was caught by the Arrowguns.

Xigbar was moving again, smirking at Roxas' skills despite himself. "Blizzard!" He cried, as Xigbar tried to disappear yet again. He began to freeze and Roxas swung again, forcing him through the portal.

Xigbar landed on the ground behind Roxas, laughing like a maniac. "Now that's more like it. You ain't half bad. But I think it's time to finish this." Xigbar joined his Arrowguns together, to create a sniper rifle like weapon. He aimed it at Roxas, and it fired hundreds of shots at one time.

Roxas' eyes widened. How was he supposed to counter something like that. _'What are you doing? Don't you dare give up!' _Sasuke!

Something took over Roxas at that point, he raised his Keyblade and focused on the darker side of his heart. Using rage to fuel his attack at Xigbar. "Oblivion…Volley!" From the tip of the X-Blade, hundreds of dark arrows were released. For a moment, Roxas' eyes glowed a golden colour.

Xigbar chuckled. "Not bad, not bad at all. Matched me hit for hit. Now let's see if you can match this!" His rifle vibrated a bit in Xigbar's hands and from out of it came a huge blast of energy, which took Roxas down.

"Damn. You two may look alike, but you're on two completely different levels. Too bad for you." Xigbar opened up a corridor of darkness and was preparing to leave.

"Oathkeeper Thrust!" The X-Blade flew out of Roxas' hand and landing on the small of Xigbar's back. He howled in pain and then started laughing. Roxas summoned his Keyblade back to his hand, after Xigbar had disappeared.

He was seriously weak after his fight with Xigbar, but he forced himself up. "Cure." He tried, but to no avail. He didn't even have enough energy left for that. He moved, slowly, towards the Emperor's palace. Two figures were looking at him, from afar, with worried expressions on their faces.

Naruto had to deal with the Heartless known as the Storm Rider. It didn't look like it was going to be easy. "Flying Thunder God Technique!" Naruto cried, throwing his KeyKunai at the heartless, as it flew past.

Naruto appeared on the creature's belly. He focused a Rasengan right into it. The creature screamed and flipped over, sending Naruto into the air.

He regained his sense of balance, while in the air, but he soon realised that the dragon was stronger than he gave it credit for.

It could control lightning and was sending bolt after bolt after him. "Rotation!" Naruto cried, covering himself in chakra so the lightning wouldn't hit.

The heartless turned over and started dropping bombs all over the area. Rotation wouldn't hold and Naruto knew that. He cursed fluently. "Ice style: White Whale jutsu! Water style: Twin Water Dragon Technique! Wind style: Typhoon Amputation!" Ice, water and wind hit the dragon with enough force to bring it down hard.

Or so Naruto thought. The dragon roared, barriers of electricity went up around Naruto. The beast's horns began to glow. Naruto's eyes widened, as a huge ball of electricity came right at him. Ready to completely destroy him.

Naruto raised his hands in defence. He tried to think of anything that could stop this. What was his strongest attack? The answer came to him in a memory. His last fight against Sasuke. "Ultimate Rotation Rasengan Combo!"

I threw the huge spinning chakra orb at the sphere of electricity, which forced it back towards its maker. With both balls of energy heading towards the Heartless, it never stood a chance.

It gave one last feeble roar, before collapsing and fading into the shadows. A huge heart left its body and raised to the sky.

Naruto smiled at his achievement. He looked at his fist and smiled some more. "I'm getting a lot stronger." He said to himself, pleased.

Shan-Yu burst through into the Emperor's throne room. Sakura, Mulan and Shang were ready for the battle. His falcon was still on his shoulder. He looked at his three opponents, not particularly impressed by them.

"This ends now Shan-Yu!" Mulan told him. The two by her side nodded, in agreement. Shan-Yu simply laughed at them, darkness began to cover him.

Hayabusa flew in at the three, swiping at them with its sharp talons. Shang didn't even bat an eyelid, as he slew the bird with one quick swipe with his sword.

Shan-Yu looked taken aback and then angry. He rushed the three, summoning heartless to his aid, as he went. Sakura took out two of her Star Cards in response. "I call on the power of my star. Ancient forces near and far. Star cards, I call on all your might. Join with me and prepare to fight! Fly, Sword! Drive form!"

Sakura's hands were replaced by deadly looking blades. Her eyes were like that of a bird, two large beautiful wings sprouted out of her back. She flew right at Shan-Yu her blades swiping against the Hun leader's skin and the metal of his jagged blade.

Mulan ran to assist her, while Shang was busy taking care of any of the heartless that he could.

Shan-Yu came forward, swinging his blade like a mad man, but against three well trained fighters, he had no chance. But that wasn't going to stop him.

He was insane. "Mulan! Watch out!" The mad swings from Shan-Yu's blade were becoming dangerous for everyone, including Shan-Yu, who was cutting himself at the same time.

Sakura put herself between Shan-Yu and Mulan. Shang wanted to know if she was alright, but Mulan was trying to focus on Shan-Yu. "Mushu! Come on! I need you." She told him, he came out of his hiding place in Mulan's clothes.

"Fiery!" Sakura yelled, summoning out her fire controller. Mushu readied himself to breathe fire and Fiery was going to assist. When Mushu opened his mouth, a huge fireball came out, engulfing Shan-Yu, incinerating him. By the time Mushu was finished, so was Shan-Yu.

The four heroes were called into the Emperor's throne room. The Emperor himself was smiling up on his comfy throne. "I've heard a great deal about you Fa Mulan." He said, Mulan blushed and bowed lower before him.

"You stole your father's armour. Ran away from home. Impersonated an Imperial Solder. You deceived your commanding officer. Shamed the entire Chinese army and dishonoured your family name." Mulan looked like she was ready to cry.

Both Naruto and especially Sakura looked like they wanted to protest. But Roxas told them to wait. "But despite everything." The Emperor said. "You have saved us all." He bowed to her, which seemed to embarrass Mulan to no end.

"Captain Li." The emperor said, turning to his right hand man. Shang nodded and gave Mulan Shan-Yu's blade, which seemed to have survived the flames. He bestowed the blade upon Mulan.

"Take the sword." The emperor began. "To show the world what you have done for China."

"Thank you so much." Mulan said. The Emperor smiled, this time also at the Key Wielders.

"You have done much for China and for my own personal being. I believe it would be unreasonable to grant you a wish for your troubles."

Mulan shook her head. "Please. You've given me enough."

"Nonsense. My dear, what does China's bravest woman desire?"

Mulan thought for a moment, her eyes settling on Shang. "May Shang, I mean Captain Li please have a vacation. He works so hard, he deserves some time off. Especially now since Shan-Yu has been defeated."

The Emperor and Shang both looked shocked. Suddenly all eyes were on the Emperor. He looked awkward and slightly unsettled. "I must admit, I didn't expect a request nearly as humble as that. But I'm afraid I must decline." Even Shang looked sad at this. "Captain Li's job is to protect me and I must be selfish in taking him for myself. However, would you like to serve alongside him and protect me also."

Shang and Mulan's eyes widened even more than they already had. "Two reeds together are stronger than one." He said, cryptically. "Of course the choice is your's." He said.

Mulan nodded, she was smiling widely. "Thank you, your Excellency."

Mulan and Shang exchanged looks. Shang rubbed the back of his head, as if he was embarrassed too. "Um…thank you Mulan. I didn't really say it up on the mountain. I'm sorry if I seemed to be treating you harshly. I was…confused, I suppose you could say."

"Is that all you have to say?" The Emperor said, smiling mischievously. "If you want to win her heart, I would say for a start that you would need a better vocabulary." Shang went as red as Mushu.

Speaking of which. "Here Roxas. You can summon guys right. Call me anytime. And I'll get your ass out of trouble." He said, entrusting a red stone into Roxas' hands.

"Thanks Mushu. I'll be sure to remember you." Roxas promised.

"Now that just leaves you're request, Key Wielders. Ask whatever you wish."

Naruto and Sakura exchanged a look and nodded, before glancing at Roxas. "You said someone in black warned you. What exactly did he say?"

"Huh?" Roxas had still yet to hear this news.

The emperor looked surprised and chuckled. "He told us how one of our legendary dragons had been transformed into a heartless and that Shan-Yu still lived. But he also told us… How did he put it Captain Li?"

"He said some wise guys were coming and they would take care of it." Roxas started to burst into laughter. "That's Sasuke. It's gotta be."

"But what's that guy doing running around with the Organization guys." Roxas shook his head.

"I don't think he is. Whatever, it doesn't really matter. We'll find out the truth eventually. But this is a clue. Maybe soon I'll find out everything…"

Everyone smiled, until Mulan gasped suddenly. Shan-Yu's blade suddenly started to glow and rise to the sky. Sakura's key was glowing in response.

She nodded, realising what this was and opened the gate, thinking of a world where a beauty lived, along with a Beast.

_A/N- So yeah. Did I mention that the next chapters would be FREAKING long. Seriously, this chapter is over 8,000 words long. That's crazy. Oh well, it should be interesting. _

_Next Time- Humanity and Beast-ity! _


	11. Chapter 11

Humanity and Beast-ity

_A/N- So everyone, I'm back at school but what's more I'm moving and that means I'm going to be taking time to try and get adjusted. Sorry everyone. And I need to warn everyone that any of the worlds that come twice; Halloween Town, Beast's Castle and such will be just as long, if not longer than the last chapter. And while I'm here, I also have to apologise that this chapter is later than it should have been. My laptop got broken. Again! Honestly, I can't wait till I get a new one for Christmas. _

The Key Wielders were gathered in front of the Gummie Ship's screen. Upon it were the faces of the different world representatives. "So what did you guys learn?" Leon asked them.

"A few things." Roxas answered, taking charge as per usual. "We learnt a few things about Sasuke, but more pressing. I'm afraid of the power the Organization might posses. I faced Xigbar alone and I was defeated easily."

"But you can't forget, you've already defeated Sasori. Sasuke was able to defeat Itachi on his own, so they can't be overly powerful. At least not all of them." Leon encouraged Roxas, who still looked doubtful.

Sakura decided to change the subject. "Have you heard anything from the Beast? Or anyone. We're heading to his world now, but we're still worried."

Leon looked uncomfortable. "No, no one from that world has contacted us. We're worried too. But we need to figure out where you guys are headed next? Any ideas?"

Roxas spoke up. "I was thinking Olympus Coliseum." He said, his eyes fixed on the screen that Hercules was usually attending, but at this moment was empty.

"I see. Okay then, good luck guys. I think I would have suggested going there next too. It seems like Hades might be giving Herc some trouble."

"Got it. Thanks Leon. We'll talk later." Roxas switched off the screen and could see the outline of Beast's Castle on the horizon.

"You've gotta stop, you know that right?" Naruto asked Roxas.

The blonds glared at each other. "What the heck are you talking about?"

Naruto started to laugh. "You. You're too serious. You need to lighten up. You're taking this whole thing, your whole life, much too seriously."

"Well, I'm sorry if I'm a little concerned about the fate of the universe, which lays in our hands!" Roxas shouted at Naruto, sizing up to him.

Naruto didn't flinch. "Oh what? And I'm not. Of course I am. But I'm not letting it get to me. I don't want to come out of this, as an old man!"

"I'd rather be an old man, than dead, along with the rest of the Universe! If losing my childhood, means that I can save the ones I love, then so be it!"

"Damn it dude! Why do you have to be like that. So high and mighty, it's like you're trying to not stoop down to my level and really let out some steam. Admit it, you hate your life as much as I hate mine. You can't just bottle up your emotions!"

"What the hell do you know Naruto? You don't know me, or at least not as well as you think. You have no idea, what it's like having to try to balance the darkness and light in your body!"

"Oh no! Because it's not like I have a giant demon fox, who I have to reign control over, otherwise he'll take control of my body. No, whatever gave you that idea?"

"Enough!" Sakura cried, coming in between the two, pushing them apart. Roxas' eyes were glowing a golden colour, the sign of darkness as well as Naruto's becoming more like Kyubbi's with each passing second.

"Stay out of this Sakura!" Naruto growled, holding out his hand where a red orb was forming in his palm.

"Not a chance. The both of you need to calm down. We're all just a little angry because we're getting sick of our lives. But fighting isn't going to help. The only thing we can do is keep going."

"You're right Sakura." Naruto said, but his Rasengan was still spinning in his hands. "But we shouldn't have to put up with him. Why don't we go it alone. Or better yet, we can go and get Li and Hinata and fight with them."

Sakura looked almost outraged, as if Naruto was insulting her by suggesting such a thing. "Naruto- no! That's…"

"You bastard! If you want me to leave, just say the word and I'll go!" Roxas started to scream. Sakura turned on Roxas, this time with tears in her eyes making the two boys feel a pang of guilt.

But suddenly Sakura smiled, maliciously, making Roxas and Naruto both flinch. They both realised that this couldn't be good.

"If you two think each other's lives are so easy. Why don't we prove it?" She pulled out one of her Star Cards. "I've always wanted to try this card, to be honest. Change card!"

There was a second of hesitation, as nothing was said. Both the boys blinked, mindlessly and suddenly the two were screaming. Pointing at the other.

Sakura laughed and the two turned on her. "What did you do?" They cried, simultaneously.

Sakura glared at them, suddenly cold. "You've swapped minds. You're now living in each other's bodies with each other's hearts. You've got the other's life now. Let's see what you think of it." She said, making both gawp at her with their jaws hanging at the hinges.

"Sakura! Change us back. We're almost at Beast's Castle. For all we know, the toughest challenge we're ever faced lies before us and you're doing this. We won't be able to fight properly in each other's bodies." Naruto fumed, however Sakura reminded herself that it was Roxas speaking.

"It seemed like the only way for you two to reconnect. That's what you need to do, but the thing is. You're lives are on the line. I wonder how long you two can keep your bodies in check, before you let loose the darkness inside."

The two were suddenly clutching their chests, listening for their hearts beating. The weight of Roxas' heart suddenly hit Naruto like a tonne of bricks. He felt the balance in his heart, but he also felt the pressure it had. Naruto felt like he couldn't breathe for a moment.

While Roxas was sensing his own heart. It was much lighter than his own, but there was a much larger tug on his will. Roxas realised that Naruto's strength was immense. He was something else, entirely, but a large part of the strength he contained was used in keeping the Nine-Tailed beast trapped, completely under his will.

"Damn you Sakura, damn you." The two cursed at their friend, until they arrived at Beast's Castle.

The interior of Beast's Castle was dark and ominous, it was in worse condition than it had been when the Key Wielders had been there last. "This looks bad." Naruto muttered, rubbing his hand along the walls where long claw marks stretched across almost everywhere.

"We better go look for Beast. Or Belle. Who knows where they are." Roxas said, looking around. His eyes fixed on a door to the right.

"There's an energy coming from there."

Naruto glared at him, slightly. "At least you can use my powers…" He mumbled. Then he stopped, as if thinking. "Byakugan!" Naruto, suddenly, shouted. Using Naruto's abilities, he was able to see right into the room. The thing giving off so much energy was a rose. A single rose in a special glass case.

Just then, a roar sounded throughout the castle. "That's the Beast!" Sakura cried, happy to know that seemed to be alive at the very least. "It doesn't even seem like he's hurt or anything."

Roxas nodded, happily. But Naruto was solemn. "If he's not hurt then why hasn't he been contacting anyone. That's what we've gotta find out." Roxas scowled at Naruto, but decided to keep his thoughts to himself, at risk of triggering Sakura's rage once more.

"Guys. We have trouble." Sakura said, pointing to the ground where heartless were moving swiftly towards the room with the rose.

"Where did they go?" Sakura asked, charging into the empty room. The three looked around, but saw no sign of the heartless. And neither Naruto nor Roxas could use their sensory powers well enough to find out where they were. However, they could sense what the source of energy was. On a table, by the fireplace there sat a glowing rose, protected by a glass dome.

Sakura approached the rose, cautiously. She looked troubled by the flower, although neither Roxas nor Naruto had any idea why. "This rose has very powerful magic attached to it." She told them, examining the rose but not daring to touch it. "It feels…malevolent. It's not dark magic, but whatever this flower is connected to isn't magic with good intentions." Sakura was about to reach out for the rose, when the heartless appeared.

Sakura jumped backwards. Naruto and Roxas took to their battle stances but they didn't look confident fighting against the heartless, as their numbers continued to grow by the second, filling up the living room. "I swear to God Sakura. This had better work." Roxas growled, menacingly.

Sakura didn't seem completely convinced at her own actions, as her eyes skirted between Roxas and Naruto, worriedly. "I'm sure it'll be fine. These guys are just shadows. Good practice for the first fight."

Naruto rolled his eyes and looked at the enemies. He attempted to make the hand signs that this body had preformed countless times. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" He cried out…but nothing happened.

"You idiot!" Roxas shouted, choosing to simply slay the heatless with his blade than rely on the powers he had at his disposal. "You used the Dragon hand sign, when you should have used the Tiger one."

Naruto huffed, but preformed the jutsu in the right way afterwards. The clones set out to each attack a group of heartless.

"Water style; release!"

"Wind style; release!"

"Ice style; release!"

Roxas watched, grudgingly as Naruto preformed the multiple attacks, taking out a good majority of the heartless. Thankfully there was still more for him to take on. "Thunder!" He cried, but again nothing happened.

Naruto burst into laughter at the sight of Roxas trying repeatedly to use the electrical attack to finish the remaining heartless. Finally Roxas couldn't take anymore. "What? It's hard!"

Naruto shook his head. "No way. Memorising hand signs is difficult. I've actually got to give you credit, I don't know how you do it. But magic is easy. All you have to do is will your powers to do what you want. It's the exact same as using Star Cards." He shrugged.

Roxas blushed slightly, possibly or from embarrassment or both. "Thunder!" He cried again, this time succeeding in destroying the last of the heartless.

"There you go. This is going great. Mark my words, by the end of the day you'll be the best of friends again." Sakura said, proud of her own experiment.

But at that moment, the room continued to be flooded with a new wave of heartless. The three cried out. There just seemed to be no end to the amount of heartless these days. And in the next moment, the doors to the sitting room were broken through by a great lumbering animal, walking on two legs and donning a purple robe and the shredded remains of a pair of royal blue trousers. Beast! The creature took out the heartless, which all targeted him as its prey. He didn't bat an eye, as he took them all out.

"It's great to see you again Beast. We were pretty worried." Sakura said, waving at him. But Beast never made eye contact with her, or indeed recognised her existence, until he swatted her away like a fly with his large hands.

Naruto caught Sakura, as she began to go flying. She looked shocked, almost as if she couldn't believe what had just happened. Naruto shouted at Beast. "Hey! What do you think you're doing! You can't just go around taking us out, what's wrong with you!" But Beast never answered. He only had attention for the rose on the table. He picked it up in his arms and cradled it, as if it were something special. Without another word, he left the room and was gone from sight.

"Something's going on here." Roxas said, looking suspiciously at where Beast had just left.

Sakura nodded, in agreement. "There's definitely something wrong here. Let's go find Belle. She'll be able to tell us something, at least." The boys liked the idea and so the three set off towards Belle's bedroom in search for the Princess.

"Her room is down this hall, I think." Sakura said, leading the mis-matched boys to where she believed Belle to be. The boys weren't sure how Sakura knew exactly where Belle's room was, but it didn't matter at this point.

At the end of the hall, were a pair of elegantly designed doors with saint like maidens on either side. A female's voice emerged from behind the doors. Naruto knocked on the door, although Roxas seemed like he was ready to bash the doors through and take out anything that could waiting for them on the other side.

Naruto had barely come away from the doors, than they had swung open, revealing the smiling face of a beautiful girl with brown hair, tied back into a long ponytail. She was wearing ribbons in her hair and a simple blue and white outfit, which almost seemed like a maid's outfit.

"You three! You're here. Thank goodness." She said, smiling at us all.

Sakura tensed up, Naruto and Roxas both turned solemn.

"Belle." Naruto said, taking the lead. "What's going on? We haven't heard from you, in awhile. Leon and the others were getting worried. The Beast…"

Belle frowned a little and she tried to avoid the three's gaze. "He's been acting strange, lately." She admitted. "He's kept me from contacting with the outside world and he's locked up all of the servants in the dungeon. They're probably the only ones, who even have an idea about what's going on. I would love to help them, but Beast…"

Roxas nodded. "Say no more. We'll help them get out and then we can help the Beast."

Belle looked reassured by this and nodded. "The dungeon's main entrance is through a door in the West Hall. I think it may be guarded somehow, but the servants are obedient enough to not try to hard to escape."

The three took in that information and set off for the West hall, searching for the missing servants. There were a lot of puzzle pieces here, but none of them fitted together. Naruto and Roxas both cursed Sakura's magic switcheroo for this. And she was happy to accept that.

The West Hall was much grander, than its east counterpart. The walls were lined with columns and statues, ones that went all the way to the ceiling. There was slightly less battle scars in this area, but that didn't mean there wasn't any. The whole place was covered in the small little details that made it obvious what had taken place within it.

The gang discovered the door that Belle talked about. It was being blocked by a large cabinet, that looked like it belonged in Belle's room. The odd part was that, amidst all of the wreckage of the West Hall, this one piece of furniture was completely untouched. Had it been put here recently?

Roxas took it upon himself to try and move the cabinet, but it seemed to take much more physical strength, which he didn't have and he only just was able to get it to move out of the doorway.

Everyone was about to go through the door into the dungeon, but then Sakura paused, her eyes wide, as she looked at the cabinet. The boys were confused, until they saw what she was seeing. The cabinet had a face. With eyes and a mouth.

Her eyes pinned them on us. "Do you mind?" She screamed, shocking everyone as they moved back away from the talking cabinet.

The boys looked at Sakura. This kind of thing was more her area of expertise. "It's the same kind of magic, around the Beast and that rose. I don't understand it, but let me move her."

She pulled out the Star Card 'The Move.' The cabinet was lifted into the air, by a pair of small red wings, which gently floated the cabinet up and gently let her down away, so the door was no longer blocked. The cabinet seemed to be sleeping and that was reason enough for everyone to hurry through the door.

Inside of the first room, the group found another door. This one seemed to be engraved with a monstrous beast, almost like a guardian. There seemed to be things like old bookcases and wardrobes tossed aside in this room, probably to be used as firewood later on. Thankfully, none of these pieces of décor were alive.

Roxas went to the door, not surprised that it was locked. "I'll open it." He said, raising the X-Blade. Before even a spark could fly out, the three heard a dark chuckle from behind and turned quickly enough to see a man in a black cloak, with red clouds on it disappear into the darkness.

"Organization XIII are here?" Sakura cried.

Naruto threw an enraged look at Roxas. "Why didn't you sense them?" He cried, gesturing with his hands that showed that he wanted to strangle him.

Roxas shrugged. "That's not fair. How can I sense them? They're literally non-existent."

Naruto looked like he was about to retort, but saw the glowing eyes of the figure carved into the door. "Get back!" He called to Roxas, who was able to jump away in time for the creature to come to life. Another heartless, of course. Actually two, although they seemed to be connected to the one body and each only had one arm.

However, those arms seemed to have no elastic limit, as they stretched over and came together to try and crush the Key Wielders. "Shield!" Sakura cried, protecting everyone from the initial attack.

"Sword! Fly!" She cried next, going in for the attack against the major foe.

Naruto and Roxas looked at each other, helplessly. What could they do exactly? Well they decided that they couldn't just stand back and do nothing.

The three all went close combat to beat the creature, as it couldn't move from its spot. But that didn't seem to be the case, as the creature banished all three of them with a wave of its hand. Sending them into the air, with no control of themselves. Without, Roxas and Naruto their normal selves, there was no way this would work out in their favour, at this rate.

Naruto huffed, looking at the heartless with his Byakugan. He hesitated for a moment and tried to avoid all of the attacks, the heartless threw at him. "Got ya!" He yelled, going forward. "Ice style; Release!" He cried, freezing the heartless.

Then he jumped backwards, raising his Key. "Release!" He cried, the ice broke, but two dark shapes escaped from the door's engravings. They were the reason that the heartless had come to life.

"Sakura! Light!" He called out and she nodded. Roxas stood in silence, doing nothing more than on looking. He was starting to feel discouraged now. Even though he was a fish out of water, Roxas still managed to be able to completely outshine him.

"Drive form! Light!" Sakura cried, her body going inside a crystal orb for less than a second and then returning wearing a pure white dress and crown. She raised one hand and light absorbed the heartless, turning them to dust.

Roxas made sure he was the one to open the door, so that it seemed he was doing something. But as he looked into the dungeon, he frowned. "There's nobody here." He called to the others.

Sakura and Naruto came in and frowned at Roxas. "You really are an idiot." Naruto told him, shaking his head. He gestured to the pieces of furniture, with all the faces. A clock, a candelabra, a teapot and a tea cup, with a small chip in it. "These are the servants!" He said, gesturing to them all.

The decorative objects jumped off their seats and continued to hop towards the other three. Roxas frowned in complete confusion, but he was starting to realise he could sense their hearts inside. It was completely different to his usual way of looking at things and it unnerved him and also fascinated him.

"Hi." Sakura said, friendly. "It's us, remember? My name's Sakura. These are my friends, Roxas and Naruto." They nodded, at the wrong names and then turned pink, realising the mistake. Sakura tried to laugh it off.

"I guess you could say they're not feeling like themselves today. Belle sent us to come and get you. She believes that you guys are the only ones who know what's wrong with the Beast." The animated inanimate objects suddenly turned a mixture of sad and solemn.

"Yes. The Master is out of sorts lately. We believe it may have something to do with a visitor he's been getting. Someone by the name of Xaldin, I believe. He goes around in this awful cloak." The clock said, in a very posh sort of voice.

Naruto nodded. "As we expected. Okay, we should be able to handle it." He promised them, despite the looks he was getting from Roxas.

Sakura inspected the objects with a burning curiosity. "This is a powerful type of magic. You all used to be human right. What happened?" She asked.

"The enchantress." The clock answered.

"It was a very long time ago, it seems." He said, waving his burning arms. He had an accent of sort. French, probably.

"It was an cold Winter's Night." The teapot began. She seemed to know the story well and seemed like an almost motherly figure to those present. Even the Key Wielders. "An old beggar woman came to the castle looking for shelter from the cold. But, the Master was a cruel person back then. Judging people on their looks rather than anything else. Because this woman didn't meet the master's high standards, he turned her away."

"Now, now Mrs. Potts. No need for such blatant disapproval of our Master's youthful antics." The clock said. Apparently his name was Cogsworth and the grand candle stick was Lumiere.

"Now, as I was saying." Mrs Potts continued. "The beggar warned the Prince to be careful how he judged those, by appearance alone. The beggar's ugliness melted away, until she was a woman with breathtaking beauty. She turned the Prince into a Beast, which she thought would best match his cold heart and as a extra punishment, she punished everyone else in the castle alongside him."

The three took in that information. They were all too aware of the Beast's surly and slightly aggressive nature, but to be punished so severely for something as silly as judging a person on their looks seemed completely crazy.

"How does the rose fit in to all of this?" Sakura asked, her mind still going at a mile per minute.

Lumiere answered. "Well you see. The enchantress gave the Master that rose, when she left. She told him if all of the petals on it fall off, he will be stuck in that form forever, as will we all. The only way for the spell to be broken would be for the Master to love and to be loved in return."

Sakura sighed, heavenly. It was like something out of a fairy tale, no wonder she found this world so attractive above all others.

"That's beautiful. But surely Belle…"

"Not yet. And it seems the two are drifting further apart. That's why we need you to get rid of this Xaldin character, so the two can go back to how they were."

The three nodded. "We'll help. Of course we will."

The group of seven moved quickly, taking a shortcut through the dungeon to get to the West Hall. "I will take Mrs Potts and Chip and take care of the castle. Cogsworth, you take our guests to see the Master. Maybe they can talk some sense into him."

Cogsworth nodded, superiorly and left Lumiere to attend to the castle, while he led the other three to the Beast's room at the end of the West Hall. The doors were even grander than Belle's, although they lacked the touch of cleanliness that Belle's had had. The scenes of struggles seemed to get worse as the group went on.

"In here." Cogsworth whispered, opening the door very gently. Inside was the Beast and a man in a cloak with his hood up. That must have been Xaldin. The member of Organization XIII.

"That Belle is such a trouble maker." The man told him. He also had a posh sort of accent, which made him seem like the perfect member of the Organization to take to the Beast, but what was he doing here?

"Be quiet." Naruto whispered to everyone and they snuck behind the broken tables and upturned wardrobes.

"She's scheming to take everything you have. Your castle, your rose…your life." Xaldin continued, although he himself had the rose in his hands. He seemed to be examining it, as if he was just as curious about it as Sakura was.

The Beast growled slightly. Xaldin nodded. "That's good. Feel your anger. Feed it. Embrace it. It is that anger alone that will allow you to become strong."

The Beast seemed to subside a little on this point. Xaldin was quick to pick up on it as well. "Oh please. Do not tell me you no longer care for strength. Let me guess, you wish to love and be loved in return?" Xaldin said it in such a icy, cold tone that the hairs on the back of each of the Key Wielders necks stood high.

"Who could ever love a Beast?" Xaldin asked the Beast, treating him like a dumb animal. But the Beast didn't object, he still had his face turned from the view of the others, but they could all sense that something was terribly wrong here. The Beast wasn't one for taking anything lying down. "Now Beast. I'm taking this rose where it can be better protected from her. It seems she has already sent people to take it for her. Eliminate them!"

Xaldin disappeared through a corridor, as the Beast turned. Everyone gasped and Roxas' eyes went wide. The Beast's eyes were a bright yellow, darkness was clinging to his body. Roxas could see it. The darkness close to taking over his heart. The Beast charged at the group's hiding spot.

Cogsworth jumped up, as the Beast was charging. Everyone screamed at him, especially the Beast. But all screams were drowned out, as Cogsworth let out a excessively loud ring. The Beast stood in the middle of the room, dazed for a few moments. Sakura took that as her chance.

"Light! I need your strength!" The light card, which was still infused with Sakura managed to give out several rays of light, consuming the Beast, but as Cogsworth bell stopped, the Beast raged on, his darkness still going completely out of control.

"Do something!" Naruto yelled at Roxas, who was staring at the Beast, not sure what to do.

"What can I do?" He shouted back. He felt completely weak and hopeless in this other body, which he didn't know how to use.

"Sakura! You have to change us back!" Naruto cried, he jumped to Sakura's side.

Sakura shook her head. "I can't. I don't have enough energy."

"Then let someone else do it. What's the Change card under?"

"…The Dark card!" Naruto cursed. He couldn't believe this and he turned all of his anger on Roxas.

"This is your fault. You're so completely useless. You can't even begin to use the powers you have at your disposal. In your body, the power source is so easy to control. It's no wonder, you're so laid back. You've never had to constantly try! You battle heartless and Nobodies, but really all you want is peace and quiet! And you take any chance you get at it."

He raised his fist to Roxas, who actually flinched, never realising that he could get so angry, but Naruto changed his direction and fired at the Beast instead. "Ice Style: Dragon Blizzard jutsu!" The black dragon made of ice and snow smashed right into the Beast sending him flying and crashing against the glass wall on the other side of his room.

Naruto let out a breath and kneeled beside the Beast, who was unconscious. "Sakura. Can you exchange the Light card for the Dark card and try to take away all this excess darkness. Naruto. Please tell me you've at least figured out how to use my cure technique?"

Roxas didn't reply as he came over and covered the Beast with a magical green aura. Sakura did as Naruto asked of her and she was successfully able to take away all of the leftover hatred and anger inside of the Beast's body. At least temporarily.

"Cogsworth…what happened?" The Beast was sprawled on the floor. Cogsworth was attempting to awaken his master and restore him. But the Beast was in a complete daze and it didn't seem he could remember anything of what happened.

"Um…well…that is to say…Master." Cogsworth mumbled, unable to string his words along to create a sentence.

"You put the servants in the dungeon. You made it so Belle could never leave her room. The darkness in your heart almost took over you. And then you tried to kill us." Roxas said, bluntly, looking at Beast, apparently unimpressed.

"What?" The Beast looked bewildered. He seemed like he was thinking and then his eyes lit up again. "Xaldin…He came from the darkness. I didn't like him…but then he used my anger to control me."

The Beast turned suddenly and roared. A sound that could probably be heard throughout the castle. "He stole my rose!" The Beast shouted and then he turned back, looking at the Key Wielders. "I'm going to kill him. Will you help me?"

The Key Wielders didn't need another second's thought. "Of course. That's what friends are for?" Naruto smirked.

The Beast frowned slightly. "I don't remember you being so…civil."

Roxas looked wounded, but tried to fake a smile anyway. "Can we just get going?" He said, not bothering to wait for an answer.

Naruto and Sakura sighed, but headed off anyway, with the Beast following and Cogsworth remaining behind to make sure that this section of the castle was secure.

"Wait." The Beast said, as we were still running through the castle. "I don't deserve Belle back. From what you've said, I've done terrible things."

"Oh come on Beast!" Sakura cried. "We know what you're really like. You would give your life to protect Belle. You probably put all the servants in the dungeon as a way to protect them." The Beast didn't look convinced, but he went on, slightly slower though.

"If you don't think you deserve her, earn her back! Defeat Xaldin and protect her. But at the same time. Let her live. Teach her to fight, if you think it would help." The Beast again didn't look so sure.

"A princess shouldn't fight. They should be protected by their Princes. To make her fight would mean that I had failed in my duties as her Prince."

"Bullshit!" Both Naruto and Roxas cried. "A princess is strong and can fight better than most people give them credit for. The light in their hearts is so strong that it can take out any threat!"

The Beast was startled by this. He wasn't sure what to make of it, so he turned solemn and continued thinking to himself. Meanwhile Sakura smiled. It seemed that Naruto and Roxas did have one thing in common. They both cared for their Princesses.

In Belle's room, the group didn't find any Belle. But they did see the cabinet (or it could have been a wardrobe, but it looked more like a cabinet) was there. She seemed shocked to see her Master here.

"Where is Belle?" The Beast demanded, in a threatening tone. If the cabinet could blush, she would have done so in that instant.

"Oh well you see. She's gone. She went out, in quite a rush I might add. Something about chasing a man in a black cloak." The Beast's pupils dilated and he threw his chest out as he screamed.

"What!" The cabinet flinched from the Beast's howl. "Why doesn't that girl do, as she's told?" He asked, but he was not expecting an answer.

The cabinet smiled a bit, as if she now understood why the Beast was so angry. "Temper, temper." She teased. "Honestly, if Belle didn't have such spirit, you probably wouldn't be so interested in her." The cabinet laughed and it gave the Key Wielders the impression that this woman was very much like a gossipy mother figure, ultimately too involved in her 'daughter's' affairs.

"Come on. Enough of this. We better go find her." Roxas said, summoning his key and looking determined to be of some use this time around.

The Beast nodded and followed him out the door, leaving Naruto and Sakura little else to do but go on and catch up. "Sakura. The dark card probably isn't going to help you here. Better break the drive form and conserve energy."

Sakura nodded, already having this idea herself, and broke the connection between her and the dark card. Then all of them found themselves in the foyer.

"Beast! Help me! Please!" Belle's voice came from inside of the ballroom. She sounded like she was in some sort of trouble. Her voice sounded weak and not entirely there.

The Beast didn't waste a second bursting into the ballroom. His eyes searched every corner, but he couldn't see her. His eyes locked onto the balcony doors, which were wide open. There seemed to be a draft and the doors opened and closed. But then his eyes locked upon Xaldin, hanging up above the whole ballroom.

"So Beast. You've finally arrived." He said, smugly.

"Where is she? Where is Belle!" The Beast was completely furious, looking as if he was about to foam at the mouth in any moment. His breathing was deep though, as if he was trying to calm down.

"Belle?" Xaldin repeated, feigning confusion. "I can assure you, she's not here. Whatever you thought you heard must have merely been the wind." He dismissed the creature's wild accusation.

Roxas stepped up in front of Beast. "What is it that you guys really want? Tell us!" He seemed just as angry as the Beast.

Roxas almost didn't expect an answer and everyone was shocked when it was actually given. "Kingdom Hearts." Said Xaldin, simply.

Kingdom Hearts was the same thing that Ansem had attempted to take control of, attempting to destroy all the worlds in order to do so. But the Organization members didn't want to destroy the worlds, so how else were they going to go about achieving their goal.

"Why?" Naruto asked. Again no answer was expected, but one came. Xaldin must have been confident that the information would be lost on those who were about to die.

"When Kingdom Hearts is ours, we can exist fully and completely." He said, deciding to take off his hood to reveal dreadlocks, sideburns and huge eyebrows. Again, more examples of why Xaldin must have been chosen to try and recruit the Beast to their side.

"So you see Beast." He continued. "That is why it is crucial to take your heartless and Nobody for our own!"

He snapped his fingers and the room was filled with enemies. A huge numbers of Nobodies. Some of them were the usual Dusk types. The other a special type, carrying lances, named the Dragoon. But there was also another type of enemy. A pureblood heartless, by the looks of it. A huge beast-like creature, which clung to the chandelier overhead. His entire presence seemed to make the room fill with darkness. Xaldin didn't seem to want to waste his time watching the fight, so he simply left through another corridor.

"Oh no you don't!" Roxas cried, he seemed pretty angry. His eyes were beginning to glow yellow. He held out his hands and a corridor of his own appeared. "Come on Beast!"

"Naruto stop it! My body isn't like your's. You can't get angry!" Naruto shouted, but his words fell on broken ears, as both Roxas and the Beast left the ballroom.

That left Naruto and Sakura alone to face the mass of enemies, including a giant heartless. Naruto growled menacingly. "I'll kill him!" Naruto declared and then hit himself, as though to punish him for being so negative.

Sakura put her arms around him. "You know it's okay to get mad sometimes right? You seem to forget that sometimes."

Naruto shook his head. "No Sakura. You don't understand. Ever since I called on the X-Blade…I can…Wait…" Naruto looked at his hands and then placed them on his chest, over his heart. A wicked smile formed on his face. To describe him in a word, he looked…mercurial.

"I'm gonna have some fun!" He said, gleefully.

Naruto moved fast, possibly faster than he usually could move. Some sort of force was driving him, pushing him to his absolute limit. A steady stream of red chakra was beginning to flow out of him.

He began to make hand signs. Hand signs that Sakura had never seen Naruto use before. "What's going on?" She muttered to herself. "Could Kyubbi…?"

"Secret Technique: Flight of the Obliterating Water!" Sakura watched as Naruto directed all of the moisture in the air to bend to his will. Hundreds of Thousands of needles were appearing in the air, made of water. "Ice Release!" Naruto cried, and they froze on his command.

No Nobody stood a chance, they were annihilated quickly and easily. They disappeared, as their beings were torn apart in every direction by the needles. Sakura was shocked by just how violent Naruto was at this point. She didn't think that switching their bodies around could have this sort of impact.

Naruto set his sights on the giant heartless, still swinging from the chandelier. "Sakura." His voice was even. That surprised Sakura. "Could you please call out Watery and Windy. I plan on taking this guy out with their help."

Sakura didn't move for a second. She was actually a little afraid. Roxas, inside of Naruto's body was angry, but he was the type of person that had an eerie sort of calm vibe around him when he got angry. It was unsettling. Still when his eyes didn't leave her, she realised she had no say in the matter and called upon the two cards he requested.

"Watery Style: Rising Water Slice!" A huge jet of fast running water came heading straight for the heartless, who tried to avoid it by mixing his presence with that of the columns around them. It didn't help, as the ones in Naruto's sight were destroyed instantly. Sakura feared that the walkway overhead would come crashing down upon them.

This didn't seem to worry Naruto though.

"Byakugan combination! Eight Trigrams; Sixty-four gale palms!" The Windy card covered Naruto's fists, as he went in at the huge beast like heartless, landing hit after hit, each one powered by the ferocious cutting power of Naruto's wind, tearing into the heartless, winding him down to nothing.

"Let's go." Naruto said, after he was through. Sakura was trembling slightly. If that was what he had done to the lackeys, Sakura really didn't want to see what he did to the boss.

Meanwhile, Roxas and Beast had been able to follow Xaldin to the courtyard. "Hurry up!" Roxas cried, the two believed that Xaldin was trying to escape. Right now, he was on the bridge. And he was holding the Rose and Belle.

The Beast stopped, unable to think or move. Xaldin had both of his most precious things in his arms right now.

"Get out of my castle." The Beast managed, his eyes never leaving Xaldin, who looked straight at the Beast the entire time.

"Oh gladly." Xaldin said, but he was smiling. That wasn't a good sign. "But first, I want to test something. Which of these two do you care more about? The Rose or Belle?" The Beast was confused at first, as was Roxas, but then Xaldin made his point by letting go of both and making the wind carry them onto opposite sides of the bridge. "You'll only have time to save one."

The Beast looked horrified. He wouldn't be able to choose. He could either give up Belle or give up any chance of her being with him. Either way to him, it would seem like he was losing his Princess.

"I'll get the Rose. You get Belle." Roxas said, dashing past the Beast and launching himself at the Rose. Xaldin didn't bat an eye, as a lance came right at Roxas, making him stop.

The Beast still didn't look like he knew which choice to make, but his eyes refocused as Belle began to scream, the winds beneath her fading away. The Beast jumped and grabbed her before she could fall. Her eyes looked past the Beast, to the rose that was about to fall, never to be seen again.

"Stop!" The Rose froze in the middle of the fall, thanks to Roxas' magic, it was safe.

Now the Beast could concentrate on taking out Xaldin, but the usually calm exterior had vanished. Xaldin was livid that his plan had failed. The wind surrounded him, fast and strong. Along with that, his weapons were six lances and he didn't seem to need to touch a single one. He had an ultimate defence. And he also had a powerful offence to go with it.

His lances all at once tuned on the Beast, sending him flying. Belle ran after him, hoping to help. She attempted to drag his body back to the safety of the castle, but it would be a slow process.

That left Roxas to face Xaldin alone. His lances came down striking him one after the other. The winds buffeted him and Roxas could barely get a hit in. He wasn't sure what to do. "Oblivion Arrow!" Roxas shouted, hoping to get a lucky hit in, but the attack was swept aside like it was nothing.

Roxas was beginning to give up hope. "Infinity Sword!" Sakura screamed, striking down with one of her most powerful attacks from overhead. The one spot, Roxas noticed, that Xaldin's defence was weakest.

Xaldin screamed in pain as the attack hit, but blew Sakura away just as easily as anything else. He then proceeded to attack her from the air. She too, it seemed, was no match for Xaldin. So who was?

Naruto laughed, approaching Xaldin. His eyes were slits, beast like and his whole body was almost in some sort of twisted fashion. Roxas watched fascinated, Belle and Sakura turned away in disgust. Even Xaldin seemed disgruntled.

"You? You've allowed the darkness to take over. Are you truly prepared to give up everything in order to defeat me?"

"Shut up!" Naruto screamed. "You're really pissing me off. I can't stand you. You think you're so superior. What are you number three in the Organization? It doesn't matter. You've been picking on my friends and I'm so sick of your pathetic Organization. It will be fun to eliminate you."

The red chakra around Naruto was building, increasing. "Drive form!" Naruto screeched. "Three tails!" Red chakra was completely pouring out of Naruto at this point. There wasn't anything anyone else could do. Naruto went on all four's, and charged at Xaldin. The winds didn't affect him, in fact, Naruto was whipping the winds for his own use. Little shockwaves were being formed in the gales as well. Xaldin was shocked.

"Impossible!" Xaldin screamed, hitting him time and time again with his lances. They seemed to bounce harmlessly off his skin.

Naruto raised a fist and was able to send Xaldin flying straight into the gates. He looked bewildered, as if couldn't comprehend what was going on. He was being beaten and about to be destroyed by this creature before him. One that held ultimate hatred inside of him. Like it was all flowing out of him.

"Roxas! Stop it!" Sakura yelled, as Naruto continued to punch Xaldin, knocking him into the gates repeatedly.

Roxas just stood there, watching. He had never realised that this was what he was capable, but he didn't understand why Roxas was so angry, why he was being so violent.

'_Because he can.'_ Came the answer. But he came inside of Roxas' head. "What? Roxas has a voice inside of his head?" Roxas screamed slightly.

'_You've got a giant, demon fox inside of you. I wouldn't judge people so quickly.' _

"Okay then, but what are you?"

'_I don't think that matters. Not right now. Anyway, the answer to your question is because Roxas can now be angry and violent.' _

"I've seen him angry before."

'_No you haven't. Not really. You see. Roxas, ever since he was born and especially since he called on the X-Blade has had to keep a balance of light and dark qualities inside of him, or he loses his powers. If he was to be too light, then he would become blinded and would try to eradicate the darkness, no matter what. If he was too dark, then his heart would give way and he would become a heartless, like everyone else. Only a much more powerful one. One that could rival even Ansem's power.' _

"What? But…he always seems so…"

'_Serious? That's because serious is the mid-way point for him. Neither too happy nor to sad. Just normal. Neutral.' _

And that's the moment that Naruto finally understood Roxas. And it was at this moment that Xaldin had disappeared into the wind, only to reappear on some sort of Dragon like Nobody. It fired a powerful laser at Naruto, who crouched down in a protective ball…made of a crystal like substance. "Four tails!" He cried.

The darkness and red chakra covered Naruto's entire being. Roxas could feel it from here. Kyubbi was awaking. The darkness returning to him. His evil mind being restored.

Roxas turned to Sakura. "Sakura! You have to switch us back right now!"

"But you won't be able to control that power. You could be killed!"

"Just do it!" He commanded, to which she had to abide to.

"Change card!" Naruto looked dumbstruck for a moment and then howled, as Naruto returned to his true body. Roxas had collapsed the moment he had returned to his own.

"Your time is here Uzumaki!" Xaldin screamed.

"Tailed Beast! Chakra Arms!" Naruto said, forcing all of the red chakra into a massive hand which continued to absorb the attack and then grab hold of Xaldin, crushing him slightly before tossing him aside.

"It's over Xaldin!" Sakura declared.

Xaldin staggered and tried getting to his feet. His lances faded away and he began screaming, as his entire essence slipped away from him. And that was that. Xaldin was no more. Another one of the Organization down. Sakura flew down to retrieve the Rose. And then she saw the damage. Naruto, Roxas and Beast were all completely exhausted. Fighting Xaldin had been too much for them and Sakura felt responsible for trying to test people. She was just like Xaldin in a lot of ways and she couldn't let her curiosity or what she thought was right be able to get the best of her.

And suddenly nothing else seemed to matter in this world. The Beast had begged Belle to stay with him, despite the danger she might be in and had thanked her for bringing his body back to the castle on her own.

The two were dancing in the ballroom now. Dressed up and having the time of their lives. "Those two are made for each other." Sakura muttered, watching them dance.

Roxas and Naruto nodded in agreement. Overall, the whole thing had been quite the experience and they were too tired to dwell into the matters yet. They needed time to rest. But first…

"I'll do the honours." Naruto said, lifting his KeyKunai at the Rose, which glowed accordingly. With his key, Naruto opened up the gate to the next world, thinking of someplace in particular when he did so.

Naruto led the way for Sakura and Roxas outside. It was partly to give Beast and Belle some privacy, but really it was to relive a memory of standing here looking up and the stars and realising just how beautiful and peaceful the world could be. "Here's to tomorrow and everything the future may bring!"

_Next Time- The true essence of a hero is darkness? _

_I'm really sorry about the length and the wait. Plus I made a few mistakes in this chapter, so I'm apologising. I'm trying to keep this story going, but it's become my least priority among other things. _


	12. Chapter 12

_Keyblade King 12: Hey. As you can see this isn't a chapter. And I apologise about that. It's been seven months since the last chapter of KNCH. Now there are loads of reasons why I haven't finished the next chapter. As I've said, I moved from Ireland to England about six months ago and I was out of school for three of those months. Because of that, I couldn't relax enough to actually do the story. After those first three months, I found I had a lot of catching up to do. I've only just finished my catching up and now I've got my exams just on the horizon. But I know what you're thinking "KK12, why didn't you just put this along with the next chapter when you finish it?" Well the simple answer to that question is; there isn't going to be a new chapter for KNCH2. Yes, that's right. I am discontinuing KNCH. _

_I know, I know. You probably want to know why and I'll explain, in the fullest terms I can. First of all, I want to let you know that this doesn't have anything to do with limited time or a lack of fanbase or anything like that. It's simply because I don't like the story anymore. In fact, when I look back at the original KNCH or even KNCH2 and especially the attempt at KNCH:COM, I can't help but feel that "I actually hate this." I originally created KNCH when I was twelve (Yes, I know, underage for the site) and back then, I was attempting to start writing. I created a plot that, back then, seemed great. I thought my story was well-written, funny and really interesting. Now that I look back at it, I know that I was completely wrong and that KNCH is rubbish. The plot is rubbish and makes no sense and completely disregards a lot of the rules of Kingdom Hearts, Naruto and Cardcaptor Sakura. And even though, some parts of it are quite good, especially the ones that are involved in KNCH2, I can't help but feel that KNCH has been 'trapped' by my younger self who set some very annoying boundaries on the story, that I can't work around without making contradictions and making it worse. Although there's more reasons than just that; as you know, KNCH2 has extremely long chapters. And honestly, I cannot continue to write chapters that are that long. They really tire me out and honestly bore me. The problem is; I can't change the length of them without changing the plot immensely which I wouldn't be able to do without messing up the story. Another problem would be that I've simply outgrown the adventure series. I've also outgrown Naruto and yes, although I love Kingdom Hearts, I realise that I don't want to write fanfiction of it anymore (unless it's some romance stories because Kingdom Hearts has great characters which I love). I find the plot of Kingdom Hearts very unique and not something I want to imitate or copy because the copies are…awful to be perfectly honest. I can't find any stories that I like that use the Kingdom Hearts plot. I've sort of moved on from playful comic adventures to more dark, gritty psychological mind games and such likes. Because of that, I really find that I don't even find the KNCH plot interesting anymore and so I cannot write it anymore, especially considering the amount of chapters still to write._

_I'm going to move on to different stories and even original stories. However, I still love KNCH. It was my starting point. It's what started it all and I'm not going to forget it. I will leave it on the site for people to read and I invite anymore who wants to take the story on to do so, as long as they tell me first. And I have to apologise to Mitsuki Lockhart and Dracula X, who were easily the biggest fans of this story and my biggest help, so I have to say sorry for ending it on them and thanking them to get me this far, because it wouldn't have been possible without them. _

_Right now, I'm putting an end to this chapter of my life and opening a new. I hope some people will come with me. Over the next few weeks, I will be continuing the story 'The Fallen Castellan' and creating a new story which will be a Death Note/Another Crossover. I may also possibly be posting an original story on DeviantArt called 'Cognitive Holocaust'. So yeah, if you want to continue my journey with me, please do so, but I won't be upset if you aren't. And if you aren't, then I suppose this is goodbye. Goodbye to you and goodbye to KNCH. Thanks for the memories. _


End file.
